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Blackkklansman
My 2nd time watching this and I liked it about the same. I'd say I like it quite a bit for the amount of issues I have with it. I love Spike Lee as a director, one of the best and most exciting of the last 40 years. I don't like much of what he says outside of film. I don't want to be so judgmental because that's a big problem today (right Spike?), so I won't call him a racist. Still, this is a guy who has spoken out against interracial couples, whites moving into black neighborhoods, and all kinds of other things, things that would have gotten him blackballed if he looked different. Maybe he's a segregationist similar to the gentleman currently in office who he supported. This is a guy who posted George Zimmerman's (found not guilty) address on Twitter. Of course that's horrible enough, but he posted the wrong address so that an innocent older couple received all kinds of death threats. Spike has $$$ though so he was able to give them 10K and call it a day. I could just do without him interjecting some of his morally questionable views into his movies. On the other hand, there were moments in this film that he treated very fairly, such as, paraphrasing, all cops aren't bad. That's an important message. Skipping to the after film sequence, it's pretty gross. It's very dishonest to pick and choose the former President's words to make it appear that he said the opposite of what he actually did say. These are the types of things that divide people and it's quite harmful.
To the meat of the movie. I was psyched to see this originally because the story is very appealing to me. There is one thing that really bothers me, and that's that Ron continues to be the voice on the phone. The only reason that is the way it goes is for comic relief. Otherwise it doesn't make sense, and of course the police would never have a Jewish cop infiltrate the Klan. These are silly additions to the movie, but they do work for entertainment value. I also have an issue with the uneven tone of the movie. I feel that in order for it to have been great, it needed to be more consistently serious, in line with the seriousness of the subject matter. Lastly, this just isn't Spike Lee at his best. At his best, his films jump off the screen with a ferocious energy. I feel like he put too much into his personal feelings and not enough into making a great film. It's still a well made movie that's entertaining and at times powerful. The acting is very good most notably from the two leads. I wasn't crazy about the score when there wasn't era specific popular music playing. Very much worth watching but a missed opportunity.
My 2nd time watching this and I liked it about the same. I'd say I like it quite a bit for the amount of issues I have with it. I love Spike Lee as a director, one of the best and most exciting of the last 40 years. I don't like much of what he says outside of film. I don't want to be so judgmental because that's a big problem today (right Spike?), so I won't call him a racist. Still, this is a guy who has spoken out against interracial couples, whites moving into black neighborhoods, and all kinds of other things, things that would have gotten him blackballed if he looked different. Maybe he's a segregationist similar to the gentleman currently in office who he supported. This is a guy who posted George Zimmerman's (found not guilty) address on Twitter. Of course that's horrible enough, but he posted the wrong address so that an innocent older couple received all kinds of death threats. Spike has $$$ though so he was able to give them 10K and call it a day. I could just do without him interjecting some of his morally questionable views into his movies. On the other hand, there were moments in this film that he treated very fairly, such as, paraphrasing, all cops aren't bad. That's an important message. Skipping to the after film sequence, it's pretty gross. It's very dishonest to pick and choose the former President's words to make it appear that he said the opposite of what he actually did say. These are the types of things that divide people and it's quite harmful.
To the meat of the movie. I was psyched to see this originally because the story is very appealing to me. There is one thing that really bothers me, and that's that Ron continues to be the voice on the phone. The only reason that is the way it goes is for comic relief. Otherwise it doesn't make sense, and of course the police would never have a Jewish cop infiltrate the Klan. These are silly additions to the movie, but they do work for entertainment value. I also have an issue with the uneven tone of the movie. I feel that in order for it to have been great, it needed to be more consistently serious, in line with the seriousness of the subject matter. Lastly, this just isn't Spike Lee at his best. At his best, his films jump off the screen with a ferocious energy. I feel like he put too much into his personal feelings and not enough into making a great film. It's still a well made movie that's entertaining and at times powerful. The acting is very good most notably from the two leads. I wasn't crazy about the score when there wasn't era specific popular music playing. Very much worth watching but a missed opportunity.
