Awkward issues arises when simple Spike Lees simple brand of storytelling is used on a global stage

Rating: 5/10 (14 June 2020)

This is an opinion piece, I realise that some movies and opinions accompanying these - are often judged in the context of American identity politics. As I am uninterested in these matters, i will try to judge this movie on its merits and only refer to political issues when they are included in the movie itself.
Those of you familiar with Spike Lee will know exactly to expect - subtlety, depth and nuance is not part of Lees storytelling arsenal.
Instead he opts for a very simple and effective emotional way of telling his stories. His protagonist are, for the most part, poor oppressed victims while his antagonist are one-dimensional bigoted ignoramuses.
Lees movies aims to tell you what to feel and when to feel, by pitting 2 visually very diffrent groups against each other. Like Camerons Avatar (2009) or most of the formulaic 90s sports movies, the audience are never trusted to do any interpretation on their own and the bad guys are never given any motivation, beyond being evil for the sake of being evil.
I was very excited when I heard that Spike Lee was to make a film set in Vietnam, following a group of American vets and that the film was to be presented to an international audience on a global streaming service.
Would this well established director have a diffrent approach when telling a story set on an international stage presented to an international audience. Or would he stick to his simple brand og good vs bad story-telling. Train-wreck or masterpiece I was in for a uniquely entertaining experience - or so i hoped.
I was excited to see :
1) If Lee would depict an occupation force, who executed, raped and burned the population alive - as the good guys. A tough sell regardless of the pigmentation of your main characters.
2) Would the countless factions involved in the conflict be depicted with any nuance. A tough task for a filmmaker who usually equates physical features with motivation and character traits.
3) Who will the antagonists be - and will they have any motivation beyond loving money and hating the disenfranchised.
4) Would Lee be able to keep his on the nose comments on the current political landscape in America distract on a level where they weren't distracting.
A great scene involving one of the main characters (Paul, brilliantly played by Delroy Lindo) is confronted by a local man and his agressive sales tactic in one of Vietnams floating markets.
As the salesman gets more intrusive, Pauls demeanour changes to the point where gets up and screams a derogatory term used during the war, at the salesman.
The salesman recognise the term and recognise Paul as a G.I. The scene explodes when pinned up rage is released, the scene is incredible well acted, well constructed and thoroughly informed by the characters and the war they are both haunted by.
For the rest of the movie most Vietnamese are depicted as a faceless mob for our protagonists to mow down in a glorious Michael Bay-like glowing CGI-blood carnage.
Later on we are told how that Pauls rage and frustration is caused, not by the atrocities done to the Vietnamese, but by him accidentally shooting a squad-mate during the war. The guilt of this is he's motivation for returning to Vietnam, he seemingly want his fallen friend to have a proper burial back in America.
This motivation changes suddenly and without any explanation. And his motivation aligns with the rest of the main characters. Go back to Vietnam to retrieve a cache of gold for themselves, gold ment to pay the wages of their allied Vietnamese soldiers.
Beyond the faceless Vietnamese mowed down in flashbacks to the wa -r and at the movies climax. The main antagonist is a double-crossing, moustache twirling, Luger-carrying cartoon villain.
Finally a bit about Spike Lees political stuff. As I have no horse in the race, when it comes to American identity politics, I would normally refrain from commenting on this.
But as this is a Spike Lee movie, I find it impossible to review the movie without mentioning it.
To be clear, i much prefer the transparency of Lee´s on the nose commentary to the way soulless marketingteams, try to sell horrible lazy remakes by slapping on some trivial social justice message, after the fact.
But some of the things introduced here is a little jarring. Lee introduces a MAGA-hat early in the movie, anyone wearing the hat is brutally gunned down in a sea of red glowing CGI-blood.
There seems to be no consistant traits or ideology between the men wearing the hat.
The movies big cathartic moment is meant to be when our surviving protagonists smuggels the money out of Vietnam, and make a huge donation to the organisation Black Lives Matter. And what might to be a fictional french-owned minesweeper NGO.
The sequence concludes with a videoclip of Dr. Martin Luther King, and a crawl with information on his murder.
Some people might think that equating Dr. Kings peaceful movement with the BLM organisations activities is poor taste.
My conclusion is this, Spike Lees brand of simple moviemaking does not translate well to more nuanced settings and stories. One or to characters get enough screentime to be interesting - as a result of their strong acting-performances not the writing.
Most of the characters very hard to care about, as they are one-dimensional and have seemingly no motivation for their actions, beyond money.
A few interesting ideas are introduced, but are quickly abandoned.
Introducing a reallife organisation and suggesting that stealing money to fund their activities, feels problematic. Equating BLM with the peaceful work of Dr. Martin Luther King, feels like a misrepresentation of his movement.
Spike Lee still have an original voice, that alone makes this movie more entertaining than most of the sequels, prequels, soft reboots, genderswap reboots and generally bland entertainment released by Hollywood these years.
Strong performances elevate the material. But with its myriad of issues I fear this title will be forgotten as soon as Netflix remove the title from their slider.