Our spy, LINK, who parted ways with the Mod Squad to spy for us, checked out an early test screening of Spike Lee's latest... HE GOT GAME. Now, I've been a huge Spike Lee fan for a long time now. In fact, Paul over at VOICES even brought Spike Lee to Texas once. However, Spike can be a bit spotty. I loved his last dramatic feature, GET ON THE BUS, and cried like crazy in the film. And when I heard he was headed to make his 'basketball' film, I was excited. I mean, Spike Lee loooooves basketball. Link here didn't care that much for the film, but hey he's Link. He's just one cool dude with an opinion. And Spike Lee films are often like Woody Allen films, in that they hit different people different ways (to the extremes). So remember, this is but one opinion from a spy who says he's a big Spike Lee fan. But hang out and judge for yourself.
well, now's my chance to enter the world of spys and such. that means i get to pick a name, just in case you post this, no? well... you can call me Link, after the amazing antonio fargas.
recently, i saw a screening of the new spike lee joint, he got game. it stars denzel washington, ray allen, milla jovavich, and ned beatty. spike wrote and directed the film, and (suprisingly) didn't even have a cameo.
i'm a pretty big spike lee fan, and he's never disappointed me up until now. he got game was one of the most uneven, poorly written movies i've seen all year. i have no idea what was going through his head, but this one needed a little more time in rewrites before it came to the screen.
denzel plays jake shuttlesworth who at the start of the movie is in prison for a unknown reason. his son, jesus, is the top high school basketball prospect in the nation, and for that reason lots and lots of people want to get a piece of the jesus pie, so to speak. colleges are waving money in his face, agents want him to sign with them so he can get a professional carreer. even the uncle that acts as his guardian gets in on the action.
the governor of the state wants jesus to go to "big state," his alma matta, and in order to insure that it happens, he arranges for jake to be released so that he can convince his son to go to big state. trick is, jesus doesn't even want to admit that he HAS a father, because of what jake did to get into jail.
problem is, jesus has no idea where he wants to go to school. he's got less than a week to sign a letter of intent, and EVERYONE wants to know where he's gonna go. he doesn't want to listen to anyone, much less the father he despises.
some of the movie is told in flashback (grainy film stock, once again missued by a director) and portrays jake a an angry, 40-sippin', abusive father. he would push jesus day after day after day on the basketball court to make him a better player, and in the end it worked. but jesus never forgave jake for the way that he was treated. i won't give away the rest in case anyone goes out to see it.
the plot was riduculous. yes, there is corruption in sports. don't we all already know that? this seems to be one of the points that spike is trying to drive home here. he's professed to be in love with "the game" for so long. why would he do it such a disservice here? there are lots of slo-mo shots of people shooting hoop, dunking, running game in the neighborhood court, and they're all set to the music of aaron copeland (who you might remember did "rodeo" the song featured in that beef commercial a few years ago). why? it doesn't fit at all. at least spike brought public enemy back to do the rest of the music.
denzel was great as jake. it was nice to see him actually acting again, instead of... whatever he's been doing lately. but it's too bad it had to be with this poorly written role. when jake first gets out of prison, it looks like he's a changed man. then for no reason whatsoever, he starts to go back to his old ways, then he's back again. this is the kind of uneven writing that i'm talking about. the characters just seemed to go where spike told them, not where they told spike. and it doesn't always work that way.
milla jovavich plays the "whore with the heart of gold" character that is supposed to be jake's redemption, but she just ends up getting in the way of the real plot. the movie should have focused more on jesus and jake's relationship, and his redemption through that. then again, as i said before, this movie should have done a lot of things differently.
ray allen wasn't bad as jesus. he's an imposing presence on the screen, and dwarfed denzel in their scenes together, which was neat to look at, but he was stuck with a one-dimentional character. jesus just wants to do good, and what's right, but he ends up randomly doing things for no reason just like all the other characters in this movie. but he got game (ha ha) so everyone wants him.
so overall, citizens of cool, this movie was just not what i expected. spike lee's got a cooler basketball movie inside of him than this. hell, he's got cooler movies inside of him regardless of what they're about. the only redeeming thing about this movie was the acting of denzel washington. and, of course, it was nice to see jim brown on the big screen again. but even slaughter himself couldn't stop this movie from turning into a brick.
so there ya have it, harry. my lovely review. hope ya liked it. i don't know if you're still directing spies to screenings and such, but i'm located in lovely boston, ma. if you hear of anything going down, and need someone to try and cover it, just drop an e-mail to me, the Link, and i'll be sure to get right on it. please... life can get dull enough here... i need SOMETHING interesting to happen to me... heh.
