Spike Lee is coming at you with his greatest and most galvanizing movie in years

Rating: 9/10 (9 March 2019)

"Blackkklamsman" Review
(9/10)
Spike Lee is coming at you with his greatest and most galvanizing movie in years. BlacKkKlansman is right up there with Do the Right Thing and Malcolm X in the Spike's Joint pantheon of game-changers.
BlacKkKlansman, adapted by Lee, David Rabinowitz, Charlie Wachtel and Kevin Willmott from Stallworth's book, demands the best from everyone, including cinematographer Chayse Irvin, editor Barry Alexander Brown and composer Terence Blanchard. (Having Get Out provocateur Jordan Peele on the producing team doesn't hurt, either.) Still, the movie breathes Lee as he walks a tightrope over the heroic best and craven worst of humanity.
Some might argue that the movie didn't need a present-day coda of the showdown between white nationalists and protesters in Charlottesville, Virginia; the notorious Trump speech claiming there was "blame on both sides"; or the still-active hatemonger Duke praising the President's comments. I am not one of those people.
While this movie may have been about a true story from back in the 70s, this true story still has tons of merit in today's society. For the most part, the moments of levity serve to keep the bleakness at bay. Evil is among us, hidden - or not so hidden - in the hearts of ordinary-looking people. As the film's final moments make clear, we need a new fight back against it.