Spike got game, no question about it. What he ain’t got is discipline and finish, always with the french pastry, wows the crowd but may never be a champ. He obviously identifies with Earl the Pearl, who gets a an extended tribute scene in the middle of the movie, the “Black Jesus” of the Philly playground, who won his championship only when the Knicks shackled his game. Now that man could create. Denzel Washington (magnetic as always) plays Jake Shuttlesworth, and Ray Allen (believable as a player if not entirely as an character) is his son, Jesus, the #1 high school prospect in the country. Jake’s in Attica (for the drunken but accidental murder of his wife) but the governor will let him out if he gets Jesus to go to Big State. Real coaches and players mix with magic realist elements in a generous celebration and expose of basketball and its place in American culture. The counter-intuitive use of Aaron Copland’s music is indicative of Spike Lee’s try-anything approach to filmmaking, but also of the mixed success of his methods. (With Malcolm X out of contention because of its 3 1/2 hour length, seeing this confirms 4 Little Girls as the best choice to represent Spike in my Dozen Directors film series, his most perfectly realized film, a documentary that nonetheless recapitulates the major themes of his features.) (1998, dvd, r.) *7*
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