Review of Do the Right Thing (1997) by Dan C — 28 Nov 2012

I've rated this highly but mostly because of the complex reaction I had, not necessarily because I enjoyed every minute of it. Spoilers! The slice-of-life mosaic of characters and moods throughout most of the movie is interesting and often fun.

There's a lot of great dialogue here, and I doubt anyone would fail to be moved to passion by the ending, whether to anger or to catharsis. I personally felt angry with the way the movie handled the fate of the white characters.

I read somewhere that black audiences were said not to ever question Mookie's inciting the riot, thus not valuing "white property against a black man's life." Are those the only alternatives? I'm not sure whether it was intentional, but Lee's Buggin' Out and Radio Raheem are seriously obnoxious characters.

When Sal finally busts up the radio, I was like, finally someone shuts that dude up. Is it racist then to demand some civility from one's customers? And then in the midst of this, when Sal breaks and starts spewing n-words, the whole group in the pizzeria is outraged.

But surely, when one is extremely angry, insulting the other person is par for the course, and what better way to insult someone than a racial epithet? Does that mean he hates all blacks? Is the mere saying of a word in the heat of passion evidence of prejudice? Surely there's nothing to call a white person that's as demeaning as the n-word, but blacks will, in a rage, refer to a white person as a cracker, whiteboy, or honky.

And all this, after Sal expresses his affection to the people in the neighborhood to his overtly racist son Pino. I'm sure if I was Sal in that climactic scene, I probably would have slipped, too, despite my usual composure.

Is that part of the commentary., then? That whites are, deep down, savage racists, despite all our civil rights gains? Are Sal and his sons oppressors in the neighborhood? It certainly doesn't look like it, though Pino seems like a jerk.

I could go on in like manner. That a movie can provoke this many questions, and such strong reactions, certainly recommends it.