Do the Right Thing :K.Reed

When Do the Right Thing came out in 1989, Spike Lee, author and director, was hoping to show a very powerful message to Americans. “Wake up! Wake up. Up you wake!” Senor Love Daddy tells us in the first lines of the movie. Not only is this for the first of the morning on the radio, but also for people watching as well as the characters in the movie. For this movie, the ideology would be explicit because as defined by Giannetti in Understanding Movies, these are, “Thematically oriented movies aim to teach and persuade as much as to entertain.” In this movie we see a problem in a community and how they try to solve it, which really just makes everything worse. As Professor Permenter notes in her commentary, “This film is framed with Love Daddy telling people to get along, cool down, and just to try and love each other. At the beginning and at the end.” Love Daddy sends to message throughout the whole movie while the violence and hate is there to entertain.

Spike Lee along with cinematographer, Ernest Dickerson, did a fabulous job with the shots and mise en scene. Used in the film often were extreme angles, such as low angles, which were used sometimes when they felt some character was speaking some truth or wisdom. Oblique angles were also used very often throughout the film to, “…make us realize something is off; sense of discomfort” (Professors commentary). And that’s just it. Watching the movie for the first time I was confused because the shot was tilted. In the film, the mise en scene you see often is red, white, and blue representing American, wanting us to feel as one nation and have peace.

Radio Raheem, who plays the song, “Fight the Power,” all day everyday. This lyric could not be truer for society. Fight the power of racism and hate in the world. There are so many hidden words, phrases throughout the film that we should listen for. In Emerson’s review, he says, “There are no uncompromised heroes, no clear-cut villains here…” Sal isn’t a hero because he loses his temper very easily and isn’t nice about everything, but he also isn’t a villain because he never did anything wrong in the first place; he is just running his business and making something of his name and some kids around the neighborhood simply didn’t like some things he did. Radio Raheem isn’t a hero because he simply brought trouble and started things with Sal just because he wouldn’t let him play music, but he isn’t a villain because he loved his music and just wanted to be able to play it. In Ebert’s review, he said, “The neighborhood is black, but two of the businesses aren't.” Near the end of the fighting scene and the burning of Sal’s, they all go to the Korean’s but they are trying to get them to stay away. He then says we are the same. The town people continue to say, “No we are black. You are not black.” But the Korean wasn’t looking at it like that. This I think was another message hidden because we are all the same no matter the skin color.

Although this movie came out 26 years ago, the message can still be heard and should be within our society. Everyone has lost the sense of peace in the world and has gone straight to violence to solve their problems. So, Wake up America! We need to find more love in the world rather than hate.

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind- Philip Agostinelli

Philip Agostinelli


Film Analysis


Dr. Permenter 


6-26-15

Blog #3

This is a movie that will leave you speechless, whether you enjoy it or are left in a blank confusion. As I finished the movie I had a rough idea of the message behind the film, but it intrigued me so greatly I went out and did more research on the film and that helped me fill in the holes that were left by confusing format of the film. This confusing format I feel was necessary in creating the true emotion and excitement of the film, if it was cut and dry and everything was spelled out for you, it would loose so much. You are supposed to think about the movie come to your own conclusion, from your point of view. The confusion creates curiosity. Curiosity is important in keeping an viewer involved in the film. The first moment that made me shake my head like "wait a second what just happened?" was when the movie ran for 18 minutes before the opening credits. And The series of events during this scene, where Joel's emotions and reactions show clementine is now gone and you're wondering "what and when did things go wrong?" This is an instant attention grabber, now you are drawn in and have to know what's going on. As stated in the review provided in the module David Edelstein "The laws of time and space are constantly flouted, yet the film moves along an unbroken thread of memories—a filament that's white-hot with emotion." Although it isn't your typical film in order of sequence of event, I agree it is overflowing with emotion and energy. There is something so fluent about the way he organized the series of events, it makes you feel like if something like this were real, this would be a spot on representation, you would feel, see, and have the exact same experience in real life as the film would depict. That is a very special quality this film has, most if not all films I have seen have some aspect that makes you feel like "oh that only happened because it's a movie, that wouldn't actually happen." There was something almost mystical the way Kaufman panned their relationship out in reverse. It made it more poetic and gave you a completely different perspective. Instead of watching a relationship crumb and getting the typical depressing feeling that relationships don’t work they waste your time and break your heart. You get a unique beauty formed watching the ruins of a relationship piece back together. And you realize the wonderful parts of their relationship and think it was time well spent, "I can't imagine not having all the old wonderful memories", and the concept that you shouldn't regret of want to forget the past, but learn from it and let it build you. We are who we are because of the event that happen in our lives. That can be taken in a very cynical or very positive way, but this movie because of the back track in his memories truly emphasizes the beauty in everything that happens to us, whether we think it is beautiful at the time or not. The message behind this film is very philosophical. That even once they know their relationship is going to crumble from right underneath them and they know they won’t be able to stop it, they still want to go through that experience. “Why would they do that?” is a common thought when this scene happens, but it’s not about the relationship lasting or failing, it’s not about retrying in hopes of a better result. It’s about the experiences the emotions the memories that you can’t imagine living without. Life isn’t similar to an obstacle course race. It’s not about the stroll across the finish line, it’s about everything that you experience before that finish line, the memories, the obstacles, the highs and lows of life.