Spike Lee’s Do the Right Thing is one of my favorite movies
because it really speaks of the time it was made, and yet is always relevant and
relatable. Yes I know that some will
argue that is might not be relevant to our time, 13 years later, or relatable
to every viewer. However it is very
relatable for me, and I feel that if the viewer truly opens their mind, really tries
to see life through other people’s eyes they will be able to relate to this movie. This movie is very important time capsule of
the time and feel of 1989, Spike Lee was not only trying to show the
complications between races, class levels, and officials. He was also making a statement of real
situations that had happened in the 1980s.
For example the use of the choke hold with the baton that killed Radio
Raheem was actually used by police officers during that time period and ended
in a death of a black man. Also the
names of Michael Stewart, and Eleanor Bumpers said from the voices of the mob
after Radio Raheem was killed were actual well known deaths from police
officers. I read the inspiration for
this movie was a racial attack in 1986 in a pizzeria in Howard Beach Queens
where a black youth was killed as he fled a group of white men. Knowing all of this really places this movie
into perspective for me. Spike Lee shows
what a day is like in a neighborhood.
No, most days do not end in riots but the energy he captured really
shows how everything is in play to produce an explosive ending to a hot day
with an atmosphere that that time brings.
The heat also really plays into the outcome in a way because with high temperatures
and no way to really cool off, it is going to be very easy for a person to
crack, or to start a situation that they never intended.
In the Washington Post Review by Desson Howe
says “late in the movie some of his conclusions could upset the most
open-minded of viewers” I would have to disagree with this statement. Overall Howe give a very good review of this
film having great things to say about Spike Lee and the movie but if you were
open minded I feel that the viewer would be more sympathetic then upset, yes it
is upsetting that the pizzeria burnt down, and that Radio Raheem died. However the conclusions from the movie make
you think deeper into our society, make you sympathetic to Mookie because he
was doing what he though was right, the tensions were so high and the mob was
so angry Mookie knew something had to happen, and instead going after a person,
going after the cops, or any other instance.
He felt he was doing the right thing.
Was he doing the right thing? That
is was he wants the viewer to question, the outcome may not have been the right
thing, and actually the one who did do the right thing was Da Mayor who
everyone brushed off as a drunk who knew nothing, however he was the one to
tell Mookie from the beginning to “do the right thing” and he was telling
people not to go into the building, and brought Sal and his sons to safety,
outside the mob.
I really liked what Emerson said in
his review, “are we going to learn to live together?” He places this movie into a good perspective
of the ending. Can people learn to live
together, can people really come together, and can people really look past superficial
differences between each other. In 2012
we are still asking the same question.
The editing and mise en scenes in
this film are excellent. From the opening
sequence with Rosie Perez’s amazing dancing to Fight the Power by Public Enemy I
was hooked, I knew this film was going to be great. I love how Spike Lee uses a lot of oblique
angles on Da Mayor and Mother Sister, Buggin Out in the pizzeria and Radio
Raheem in the pizzeria. He also likes to
use sever low and high angles giving a very particular feeling for the
viewer. I noticed a lot of mise en
scenes throughout this film, the first clip you see of Mookie is a mise en
scene with the camera coming into the room with him counting money. Another example is when he is walking down
the street then stops to talk to Mother Sister.
The most notable mise en scene for me though is at the end with Mother
Sister and Da Mayor in her apartment talking, you see a close up of their
conversation then they start to walk towards the window, the camera scales back,
backs away through the window and then pans down the street all without a cut.
I love the dynamics of this movie,
and who he had to play the characters, for example the relationship and tension
Spike Lee put in the characters of Mother Sister (Ruby Dee) and Da Mayor (Ossie
Davis). In reality Ruby Dee and Ossie Davis
have been married for a very long time. And you can see this wonderful connection
between them. I also love how he has
Buggin Out make a huge fuss about the fact that there are no black people on
the wall of fame in Sal’s pizzeria but in fact Giancarlo Esposito (Buggin Out)
is Italian and black, and considers himself Italian American because he was
born in Italy.
This movie is a great movie with a
very important message of asking people to “WAKE UP” asking people to LOVE and
to try to get along.
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