Transcendent

Rating: 10/10 (16 June 2006)

This is one of Spike Lee's best films. And the use of Copland's music only punctuated what absolute tenderness was already there. One of the last scenes when Washington's character throws the basketball over the prison wall and impossibly into Jesus's court while playing (one of the obvious interpretations of this scene being "the ball is now in his court") is one of the most beautiful scenes I've ever seen--pure magic. That last scene is so full of meaning and symbolism that it overpowers the mind with all the instinctual emotions that goes with that scene: namely the often difficult and mythic relationship between fathers and sons, forgiveness, acceptance, and of course transcendence.