Even after all these years, “He Got Game” (1998) might still do the best job of any movie when it comes to depicting the pressures and temptations of being a great athlete in the ghetto. It also has all the Spike Lee hallmarks: intelligent music choices, inventive editing and cinematography, and a strange mix of professional and amateur actors. The latter hurts the movie’s flow, because, frankly, some of the performances are awful. Ray Allen does OK as a high school basketball phenom. Among the pros, Denzel Washington is his usual amazing self and Jim Brown makes a welcome comeback.
Archives for posts with tag: Spike Lee
If you took a Sunday newspaper op-ed on Chicago gang violence and tried to turn it into a feature-length motion picture, you would get something like “Chi-Raq” (2015). I don’t fault Spike Lee for trying. It’s a worthy subject and his idea of using the ancient Greek play “Lyisistrata,” in which women use sex as a weapon – withholding it until their men declare peace – is inspired. But as a movie, it seemed more like an unfinished work. Lee has a bunch of creative ideas he is trying to work out on film, but never develops any kind of narrative flow.
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