Inflitrate Hate

Rating: 6/10 (15 August 2018)

BlacKkKlansman is a generally well made, crowd pleasing movie but, I have a lot I want to say about it so, this is going to be a spoiler heavy, very long review.
The first shot of the movie from "Gone with the Wind" is a very bold and clever start, both establishing the tone and calling forward to Ron's discussion with David Duke. The opening scene featuring Alec Baldwin felt kind of unneeded. Also, having the red text with black text under layed looked like something I would to in Windows Movie Maker for a 7th grade Chemistry presentation. However, despite this issue, I still really think this is an absolutely brilliant opening scene that perfectly establishes the tone of the rest of the film.
So, when we are first introduced to Ron Stallworth, the scene is very well done, classic Lee using cinematography and framing to the best of his advantage. The police station is very well shot and interestingly lit for the most part. There are a couple scenes in which I felt they weren't all that well lit, for example the scene which Ron and Flip first pin up their membership card to the Ku Klux Klan was a bit too dark.
The scene with Kwame Ture's speech is the first sign of some of the film's worst qualities, ham fisted dialogue and bad editing. Did we really need 15 insert shots of crowd reactions that faded into each other? I don't think we did. I should also mention Ron's generic love interest, Patrice. I found none of the scenes between them interesting whatsoever. You know exactly where they are going to go and, you have seen those same scenes in movies a million times before. It isn't surprising that the real Ron Stallworth says Patrice was an entirely fictitious character created to add tension in places were it didn't really exist.
If anything, I found the scenes between Flip and the Klansmen to be some of the movies best scenes. You always got a vibe of uncomfortability. That being said, whenever a joke was attempted it always had the same set up and punchline of "Klansman says something racist, Flip contradicts it and seems not racist, Flip then corrects himself and makes it a joke that's racist". That was kind of annoying. However, overall the writing and dynamics between various characters in these scenes was very great. For example Flip and Felix, Flip and Walter and Walter and Felix. These dynamics were all well written and added a lot to the dialogue between the characters, made it feel more natural. They were written well enough were you could imply things about the characters. The only notable example of a Klansman who I can think of that wasn't given much development was Connie and Ivanhoe, who felt kind of flat.
Now, most of the acting in the film is pretty great, notably John David Washington, Adam Driver and, Jasper Pääkkönen. However, if there was any one actor who was kind of bad it was Topher Grace, who portrayed David Duke. I wish I could say it was an intentional choice made for the sake of having David Duke sound wooden and robotic. However, Topher Grace is just a bad actor and, I can't get past that in my head. It doesn't help that whenever he, or for the record most of the actors in the film, says a racial slur and delivers it super uncomfortably, thinking Spike Lee is going to come from behind the camera and sock him in the jaw for saying the N word.
Now, to delve into some of the harder stuff to talk about in this review. The subject of race and, what Spike Lee is trying to say. I frankly think there were some things that were delivered subtly enough but, others that were so obvious it felt like he thought I wouldn't get it because I was too stupid. The good subtle things were when Kwame says (paraphrase) "We need to learn that we don't need a white man to do things" and Ron says later (paraphrase) "With the right White man, I can do anything." That was one of the really great subtle things in the film that I picked up on. However, did we really need to cut back and forth between the Black Student Union meeting and the Klan meeting to get the point? Did we really need a character to say "No one like (David Duke) THAT would ever be elected to public office." Ha ha. You get it? It's like Donald Trump! It's not like I made that really obvious and that same idea could've been implied without it being blatantly shoved down the audience's throat. Honestly, that part of Spike Lee's writing really annoys me. It feels so cheap and forced every time. It felt forced at points in Do the Right Thing and, it feels no different here.
Now back to the film itself. The climax of the movie was absolutely fantastic and, so well executed it baffles the mind how Spike Lee and, the rest of his team can write climaxes to his stories so fantastically. Upon first viewing, the ending to the film with wrapping up every loose end felt kind of cheesy and really dragged on. Upon a second viewing, it felt much more quickly paced but, still a bit cheesy. The blacksplotation parody part was really cool and, a great callback to the discussion Ron and Patrice had earlier in the film. Now onto the ending ending. The Charlottesville footage is such a shocking and strong ending it is sure to stick with audience members. However, Spike Lee makes the genius decision to play music over this scene. Wow great, now I'm kind of taken out of the moment. He also has to use cheesy red text to dampen the strong emotion the ending would make you feel. Not to mention throughout the entire film, music has kind of been inappropriately placed. There were just scenes that would've benefitted from being silent and let you interpret for yourself how to feel.
Overall, I enjoyed BlacKkKlansman. I mean I saw it in theaters twice. I'd see it in theaters a third time because it's such a fun and enjoyable movie with some issues. This is the first movie I've seen this year that was nominated for the Palme d'Or and, if this is setting the bar, than we can expect some rather exceptional films to set the bar even higher.