Spike Lee rants.

[Bullitt68]

It took me a long time to come around on him, but I genuinely love Spike Lee's films now. Initially, his aggressive polemics were very off-putting, but over time I came to appreciate his originality and his commitment to telling the stories he wanted to tell the way he wanted to tell them. Do the Right Thing is far and away his masterpiece, that's about as controversial as saying Citizen Kane is Orson Welles' masterpiece or Boyz n the Hood is John Singleton's masterpiece, and BlacKkKlansman is by far the best thing he's done in the 21st Century, but my favorites of his are School Daze and He Got Game. The former is criminally underrated, Laurence Fishburne is amazing and Ernest Dickerson shoots the hell out of it, plus it has one of my favorite depictions of friendship ever. I love the scene when they all fight over protesting apartheid and risking their student status and then instantly squash it and go to KFC, and then at KFC when they run afoul of Samuel L. Jackson and his cronies...it's just a phenomenal stretch of film.* And then the latter is one of the most underrated sports movies ever and easily the GOAT basketball movie, Denzel turns in his most underrated performance and the father/son saga is extremely powerful, all the way up to that beautiful surreal ending.

*This doesn't have the fight preceding it, but here's the famous KFC scene from School Daze:



And then just for the hell of it, I have to shout out Spike directing The Original Kings of Comedy. RIP Bernie Mac.

 

[Mr.Maelstrom]

Summer Of Sam is a gem that isn't talked about enough

Watched it with my girl on Saturday oddly enough

 

[HUGHPHUG]

Watched it with my girl on Saturday oddly enough

What did you think?

 

[Mr.Maelstrom]

What did you think?

I've loved it for years, she'd never seen it. This time of year, I love to watch movies where the oppressive heat is a part of the story.
Die Hard with a Vengeance, Falling Down, etc.

It's the film that got me into Spike Lee's filmography, probably my fave overall of his with 25th Hour as a close 2nd

 

[StewDogg11]

It took me a long time to come around on him, but I genuinely love Spike Lee's films now. Initially, his aggressive polemics were very off-putting, but over time I came to appreciate his originality and his commitment to telling the stories he wanted to tell the way he wanted to tell them. Do the Right Thing is far and away his masterpiece, that's about as controversial as saying Citizen Kane is Orson Welles' masterpiece or Boyz n the Hood is John Singleton's masterpiece, and BlacKkKlansman is by far the best thing he's done in the 21st Century, but my favorites of his are School Daze and He Got Game. The former is criminally underrated, Laurence Fishburne is amazing and Ernest Dickerson shoots the hell out of it, plus it has one of my favorite depictions of friendship ever. I love the scene when they all fight over protesting apartheid and risking their student status and then instantly squash it and go to KFC, and then at KFC when they run afoul of Samuel L. Jackson and his cronies...it's just a phenomenal stretch of film.* And then the latter is one of the most underrated sports movies ever and easily the GOAT basketball movie, Denzel turns in his most underrated performance and the father/son saga is extremely powerful, all the way up to that beautiful surreal ending.

*This doesn't have the fight preceding it, but here's the famous KFC scene from School Daze:



And then just for the hell of it, I have to shout out Spike directing The Original Kings of Comedy. RIP Bernie Mac.

He Got Game’s plot was just too stupid and farfetched for me. Denzel will be let out of prison on a murder charge if he gets his son to go play college basketball for the governor’s alma mater? Ehhh.

 

[Bullitt68]

He Got Game’s plot was just too stupid and farfetched for me. Denzel will be let out of prison on a murder charge if he gets his son to go play college basketball for the governor’s alma mater? Ehhh.

First, it was an accident, not first-degree murder. Second, he'd already served six years, so it's not like they were just letting him off. Third, they fucked him over anyway. Sounds exactly like something that'd happen.

 

[StewDogg11]

First, it was an accident, not first-degree murder. Second, he'd already served six years, so it's not like they were just letting him off. Third, they fucked him over anyway. Sounds exactly like something that'd happen.

Didn’t he push her down in the kitchen and she hit her head on the counter? Not really a totally innocent accident.

My other gripe was Ray Allen. I guess Lee wanted a real basketball player for authenticity’s sake but that came at the expense of the acting. He’s not bad per se but I wouldn’t really call his acting great either.

 

[Bullitt68]

Didn’t he push her down in the kitchen and she hit her head on the counter? Not really a totally innocent accident.

Not murder either. It's not like they were telling a serial killer convicted of 27 counts of first-degree murder that he could go home if his kid plays basketball at the right college.

My other gripe was Ray Allen. I guess Lee wanted a real basketball player for authenticity’s sake but that came at the expense of the acting. He’s not bad per se but I wouldn’t really call his acting great either.

Spike wanted Kobe but Kobe was too focused on his game to take time off. But yes, he wanted authenticity and I'm fine with Allen's performance since it came with him being legit. And Denzel really playing one-on-one with a real basketball player and really scoring on him and Allen really getting competitive...yeah, I'm good with it.

Maybe give the film another watch down the road, you might warm up to it.

 

[Crazy Source]

It took me a long time to come around on him, but I genuinely love Spike Lee's films now. Initially, his aggressive polemics were very off-putting, but over time I came to appreciate his originality and his commitment to telling the stories he wanted to tell the way he wanted to tell them. Do the Right Thing is far and away his masterpiece, that's about as controversial as saying Citizen Kane is Orson Welles' masterpiece or Boyz n the Hood is John Singleton's masterpiece, and BlacKkKlansman is by far the best thing he's done in the 21st Century, but my favorites of his are School Daze and He Got Game. The former is criminally underrated, Laurence Fishburne is amazing and Ernest Dickerson shoots the hell out of it, plus it has one of my favorite depictions of friendship ever. I love the scene when they all fight over protesting apartheid and risking their student status and then instantly squash it and go to KFC, and then at KFC when they run afoul of Samuel L. Jackson and his cronies...it's just a phenomenal stretch of film.* And then the latter is one of the most underrated sports movies ever and easily the GOAT basketball movie, Denzel turns in his most underrated performance and the father/son saga is extremely powerful, all the way up to that beautiful surreal ending.

*This doesn't have the fight preceding it, but here's the famous KFC scene from School Daze:



And then just for the hell of it, I have to shout out Spike directing The Original Kings of Comedy. RIP Bernie Mac.

I could not have said it better myself. Tip your hat to "Clockers". Delroy Lindo is an amazing actor.

 

[Peteyandjia]

My favorite film of his has always been Bamboozled. It's a masterpiece. The final montage is the most powerful thing he's ever done.

When people ask, what is THE worst movie you have ever seen? I always have the answer ready. Saw it when it came out, and yet this steaming pile of absolute dogshit still has yet to be topped. (Bottomed?)

 

[Madmick]

When people ask, what is THE worst movie you have ever seen? I always have the answer ready. Saw it when it came out, and yet this steaming pile of absolute dogshit still has yet to be topped. (Bottomed?)

Can't say I think about that much.

 

[Streeter]

She's gotta have it

 

[J_C]

He has a way of compacting feelings and racism in a way that is refreshing. Say what you mean and hash it out. Talk to people with honesty. We have a lot more in common than not.





Leave you with a scene from an amazing movie. Spike Lee directed it, but Micheal Imperioli wrote it and tried to get it paid for but couldn't. He asked his friend Spike to direct it, as they were friends from way back in NY. Fantastic movie.

never saw the movie but in the 1st video why is dunking on italian americans insulting to the jewish guy?

 

[Jack Reacheround]

My favorite film of his has always been Bamboozled. It's a masterpiece. The final montage is the most powerful thing he's ever done.

I love that movie?

 

[Crazy Source]

never saw the movie but in the 1st video why is dunking on italian americans insulting to the jewish guy?

The absurdity of racism is what Lee was aiming for in my opinion. We can get into whether being antisemitic constitutes racism, but that is not a rabbit hole I care to crawl down. In the end we all wake up and put on our pants. We wash our faces, and we get ready for another day. When we act uniformly, as a community, regardless of race or ethnic background, we form a powerful bond.

 

[Brother Numsi]

This is one of the better Spike Lee threads I’ve seen online in a long time. Folks are actually focusing on his craft as a filmmaker and not how they feel about him personally.

Lee is a masterful director. He has had some duds and can be self righteous at times, but most directors are. I do think Spike gets a lot more flack at times because he’s not afraid to call out ignorance as he sees it.

Do The Right Thing and Malcolm X are his masterpieces

He Got Game is my personal favorite.

Blackkklansman was awesome. True story, a worker at my job found a pair of Lees gold Jordan’s that he wore at the Academy Awards when he won his first Oscar. It wasn’t the pair Lee wore but they were auctioned off for a nice some of money which went to our programs for the homeless.

25th Hour might be his most underrated film

I loved how Spike Lee gave criticism of Oppenheimer for not including the Hiroshima fallout in the movie but still praised Nolan’s work.

 

[Bullitt68]

Do The Right Thing and Malcolm X are his masterpieces

I've always had trouble with Malcolm X. That first chunk, with him and Denzel looking like Jim Carrey and Jeff Daniels...

...it's too self-indulgent. I get having the arc of him becoming Malcolm X, but everything before that just felt weird and weak. Once he becomes Malcolm X, it's phenomenal, and Denzel crushes that role as of course he would, but the early portion always dragged it down for me. Though it has been years since I've watched it.

He Got Game is my personal favorite.

How do you know a man's serious about basketball? Let him out of prison and he goes right to get the new Jordans

25th Hour might be his most underrated film

Only watched it once and didn't like it. Been meaning to check it out again for years, especially since over time more and more people talk about how underrated it is.

 

[Zer]

He Got Game is real gem that seems to be largely forgotten. Definitely my fav movie of his. Glad to see it get some love in this thread

I don't care about Basketball at all, but Basketball movies always seem to be good. Really American sports movies are great in general even though I don't watch any of their sports.

 

[Bullitt68]

He Got Game is real gem that seems to be largely forgotten. Definitely my fav movie of his. Glad to see it get some love in this thread

I don't care about Basketball at all, but Basketball movies always seem to be good. Really American sports movies are great in general even though I don't watch any of their sports.

Weirdly, I've experienced something of the reverse. In my first few years teaching film at different American colleges, there are ALWAYS kids who love sports movies, but He Got Game split the crowd. Some people really respond positively to it, and there are always one or two kids who say it's one of their favorites, but there are also some people who really respond negatively to it, they don't like the vibe or the aesthetic or the characters. Knowing that Spike's a polarizing figure, I'd always regarded He Got Game as one of his least polarizing films, but even working within the familiar confines of the sports movie, his style isn't for everyone.

On my side of things, being able to teach it in a bunch of classes and not only rewatch it a bunch but talk about it and break it down with different classrooms of students, I've come to love and appreciate it even more. The crosscutting between Denzel and Ray Allen to show father and son with their same habits and mannerisms, the awkward genuineness when Denzel hugs him and he wants no part of it, the intensity of the scenes with him as a little kid on the court and then beating his dad one-on-one. And I always blow some students' minds and can see it on their faces when I tell them that they improved the one-on-one game and Denzel trained his ass off because he was determined to make it look like he was good enough to have a kid as good as Ray Allen and was intent on really scoring on him, and then Allen really got competitive, and Spike knowing filmmaking and basketball so well knew that the real offscreen competitiveness between actor and athlete would make for amazing onscreen competitiveness between father and son.

And then all of this is just focusing on the father/son angle. There's also the extraordinary satirical skewering of basketball politics, the ridiculousness of college recruiting, the media insanity, the pieces of shit trying to ride his coattails. It's at once a very "insider" basketball movie and a universal coming of age/overcoming adversity story. So much going for it. The only "weakness" is probably the Milla Jovovich subplot, which I get is there to humanize Denzel but which I still don't feel needed to be there. But Denzel's so good in the role and he brings so much to the character that I don't mind it being there.

Last but not least, so many of my favorite opening credits sequences are sports movies - two of the GOAT are De Niro sports movies in particular, Raging Bull and Bang the Drum Slowly - and He Got Game is right up there with that beautiful montage of different people playing basketball in different places, all united by love of the game.

 

[Brother Numsi]

Weirdly, I've experienced something of the reverse. In my first few years teaching film at different American colleges, there are ALWAYS kids who love sports movies, but He Got Game split the crowd. Some people really respond positively to it, and there are always one or two kids who say it's one of their favorites, but there are also some people who really respond negatively to it, they don't like the vibe or the aesthetic or the characters. Knowing that Spike's a polarizing figure, I'd always regarded He Got Game as one of his least polarizing films, but even working within the familiar confines of the sports movie, his style isn't for everyone.

On my side of things, being able to teach it in a bunch of classes and not only rewatch it a bunch but talk about it and break it down with different classrooms of students, I've come to love and appreciate it even more. The crosscutting between Denzel and Ray Allen to show father and son with their same habits and mannerisms, the awkward genuineness when Denzel hugs him and he wants no part of it, the intensity of the scenes with him as a little kid on the court and then beating his dad one-on-one. And I always blow some students' minds and can see it on their faces when I tell them that they improved the one-on-one game and Denzel trained his ass off because he was determined to make it look like he was good enough to have a kid as good as Ray Allen and was intent on really scoring on him, and then Allen really got competitive, and Spike knowing filmmaking and basketball so well knew that the real offscreen competitiveness between actor and athlete would make for amazing onscreen competitiveness between father and son.

And then all of this is just focusing on the father/son angle. There's also the extraordinary satirical skewering of basketball politics, the ridiculousness of college recruiting, the media insanity, the pieces of shit trying to ride his coattails. It's at once a very "insider" basketball movie and a universal coming of age/overcoming adversity story. So much going for it. The only "weakness" is probably the Milla Jovovich subplot, which I get is there to humanize Denzel but which I still don't feel needed to be there. But Denzel's so good in the role and he brings so much to the character that I don't mind it being there.

Last but not least, so many of my favorite opening credits sequences are sports movies - two of the GOAT are De Niro sports movies in particular, Raging Bull and Bang the Drum Slowly - and He Got Game is right up there with that beautiful montage of different people playing basketball in different places, all united by love of the game.

That He Got Game intro was beautiful work.