Do the Right Thing (20th Anniversary)

Spike Lee's racial and political filmmaking bent is given the full treatment with this simmering exposé of racial tensions in a New York City neighborhood one scorching summer day. The film, written by Lee (and nominated for an Oscar), follows a group of racially diverse inhabitants from Brooklyn's Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood as they spend their day trying to avoid the oppressive heat. These include African American pizza deliveryman Mookie (Lee), the racially sensitive Buggin' Out (Giancarlo Esposito), and the silent, boom-box-blasting Radio Raheem (Bill Nunn). Also thrown into the mix are Sal (an Oscar-nominated Danny Aiello), the Italian-American proprietor of Sal's Pizzeria, as well as his two sons, Pino (John Turturro) and Vito (Richard Edson), who hold completely opposing attitudes when it comes to race. After Buggin' Out tries to organize a boycott of Sal's because of the lack of racial diversity on his shop's Wall of Fame, the tensions explode in an act of senseless violence. Lee's film is an electric work of political entertainment that confronts sensitive racial issues head-on. He deftly blends humor and drama as well as using specific music to further amplify his theme (Public Enemy's song "Fight the Power" actually becomes the film's main catalyst for action). Boldly closing the film with opposing quotes from Malcolm X and Martin Luther King on the nature of race relations, Lee leaves it up to the viewer to decide if Mookie's actions were the correct ones. Aiello and Esposito are standouts in an all-star cast that includes Lee himself, his sister Joie, "discovery" Rosie Perez, and the married team of Ossie Davis and Ruby Dee. Always one to spark controversy, Lee's summer drama finds the filmmaker at the peak of his craft.

In Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn, disc jockey Mr. Señor Love Daddy wakes his morning listeners with soulful rhythms and prepares them for the sweltering heat of the summer's day. The nearby eatery and hangout is Sal's Famous Pizzeria. Young locals Buggin' Out, Radio Raheem, and pizza delivery guy Mookie view Sal's as a symbol of the successful economic and cultural assimilation of Italian Americans and as an oppressive economic force that profits at their expense. Existing racial tensions between merchant and community are exacerbated when Sal refuses to place pictures of prominent African Americans on his shop's Wall of Fame. When Radio Raheem and Buggin' Out confront Sal on his exclusionism, tempers fly and tragedy ensues. Spike Lee's DO THE RIGHT THING is an electrifying motion picture that remains one of the 1980s' most powerful films. In portraying a day in the life of several Brooklyn residents, Lee builds his story at a leisurely, comic pace, building to a violent climax that raises questions rather than answering them.

African American Cinema | Essential Cinema | Race Relations | Recommended