New Year's Countdown...of Excellence: 4 - Do The Right Thing (1980's selection)

4
Do The Right Thing
1989, d. Spike Lee - rental

The Story (in two paragraphs or less)

It's a sweltering hot summer day in NewYork.  The film traverses a block in the neighbourhood of Bed-Stuy over the course of the day, centering primarily around Sal's Famous Pizza, owned and operated by Italian-American Sal (Danny Aiello) and his two sons.  Mookie (Spike Lee) is Sal's delivery guy, with only a mildly contentious relationship with his employer.

The film is largely "a day in the life" of this neighbourhood, with Mookie as our main POV character, traversing its denizens, primarily Black, but also Puerto Rican, the white guy who signals gentrification anxiety, the Korean market owners, Sal and sons, and of course, the police. Most everyone gets along but there are people who have problems, and the attitudes are all very New York, a lot of aggressive, verbal confrontations.  But the heat only seems to be exacerbating the aggression, which spills out late in the evening into a racially charged confrontation.

What did I think I was in for?
Pretty much this, only I think I was expecting it to feel more of its time.  With the exception of a few touches (mainly the opening credits which features Rosie Perez dancing to the Public Enemy's "Fight the Power" in what is basically a music video for the song) this could very well be a contemporary film commenting on modern race relations, just set in 1989.  

What did I get out of it?
While it does sit in the uncomfortableness of race relations in America (in this multicultural microcosm of Bed-Stuy), it's not sermonizing.  Lee crafts a pocket world that, while stylized with its vibrantly painted backdrops, still is grounded in very tangible sentiments.  His street is populated with people with their own thoughts and minds and ways of being.  There's no hive mind here, no singular way of thinking, and everyone seems liberated to speak there mind, no matter what conflict it raises or what wounds they dig.  And yet, there's a sequence which Lee seems to signify that some (and perhaps the few are just stand-ins for the many) of these people are holding something back, mainly their most vilely racist thought and ideas about the people around them. Insinuating that underneath the bumpy, fragile surface, is rage.

The image of Malcolm X and Martin Luthor King, together, smiling, shaking hands, is used throughout the film, as is Radio Rahim's Love/Hate knuckle rings.  The film closes with quotes from both King and X, one condemning violence as a barrier to brotherhood and understanding, the other condoning violence as a method of last resort, as self-defence, at which point it is no longer violence.  This tug of ideologies is exemplified in the climax of the film, following the all-too-familiar choking death of Radio Rahim by the police (30 years later, it's still the same damn story) where a understandably emotional crowd cannot direct their anger at the real perpetrators, systemic racism and the police in power, so Mookie points it at Sal's restaurant.  For him, it is his most direct symbol of systemic oppression, and it becomes the outlet for hate, rage, and grief.

Is there still sympathy for Sal? Who aggrieved Rahim in smashing his radio, prompting the escalation that got Rahim killed?  Sure, but the point here, as was the same point in Black Lives Matter protests in 2020, lives should matter more than property, and yet the property gets attention, gets protection, gets value assigned to it where lives, Black lives, do not.

Do I think it's a classic?
It still feels so of-the-now it's hard (and very sobering) to be believe that it's over 30 years old, but yes, absolutely a classic.  Lee's direction, still in its early form, is so assured.  His in-you-face close-ups and from-the-ground perspective still feels like nothing else.  He only occasionally operates with these techniques today, but they're clearly still his own.

Did I like watching this?
One thing I was expecting, which didn't happen until late in the movie, was that I would feel uncomfortable watching this movie.  I did not feel uncomfortable until I started seeing Rahim being choked by the police, and I started tearing up instantly, knowing exactly where it was going, and knowing that it had nothing to do with George Floyd, Eric Garner or any of the all-too-many other Black men in the news who have been choked to death by the police in recent years, that this shit has been happening for decades, well before Do The Right Thing and well too long after.  Following the death and the destruction of Sal's, life just goes on in the film.  Sal and Mookie even come to terms with each other (and apparently there's little hints in subsequent Lee projects that Mookie's still delivering pizzas for Sal's).  

Would I watch it again?
Absolutely, and I'm kind of pissed with myself that this is the first time I've seen it.