Consistency is maintained below with Spike Lee's published journals from the production of Do the Right Thing in the capitalization choices of "Black" and "white."
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Spike Lee: I know the cops did the wrong thing, that's for sure. And what's sad is that they continue to do the wrong thing and nothing ever happens. For me, that's what the movies about, you know, about human life and how, in America, Black life has become devalued; where it's not, you…
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Do the Right Thing: 20 Years Later 2009
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Do the Right Thing 1989
SPIKE LEE: Here come “New York’s Finest.” The title Do The Right Thing does not really refer to Mookie throwing the garbage can through the window, I mean. My experience, you know, since this film’s come out, the white audience, they’re more concerned about destruction of property, the destruction of Sal’s Famous Pizzeria, than they were about the death of Radio Raheem. I think they should ask themselves that question: why are they more concerned with the property of this…
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Little Women 1949
Lol, requisite sexy foreign man Rossano Brazzi is actually Italian but playing a German character and I died when the opera he takes Jo to is Martha, a German opera, but we hear it being sung in Italian.*
And then when he goes "Who will go to de opera wit me?" like a sad li'l boy, jeez, only RB could pull this kind of stooge off. This said, the 'Baehr sings' sequence (not always the same art song, but always…
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Their Own Desire 1929
Singular opening to the Normy Sheary/Bobby Monty universe (of which I am the fan club founder).
I’m going to do a documentary about it, slow down
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Mank 2020
Someone says "Aircraft carriers are a shitty idea" with a completely straight face in a film about screenwriting. A film so full of howlers and cringey missteps that I actually think the whole pointless Welles character assassination barely registers (because it's also barely in the movie). Don't throw Norma Shearer under the bus like that. Be sure to tell everyone in the audience who and what everyone is at every moment! Typewriter screenplay scene transitions and reel changes, yikes! Needless…
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Always Tell Your Wife 1923
The BFI Mediatheque currently has it as a streaming selection and I watched it at their Southbank London location. The surviving reel runs 12 minutes, features a fair amount of intertitles, and is a very dry and slow affair, elegant in its way. The opening credits are included and all of the labelled cast members look exactly as they should. As far as I can tell, this film is only viewable at these BFI locations, but it is totally free…