Intelligence as Self-Awareness, Self-Awareness as Self-Defense, Self-Defense as Violence ...

Rating: 10/10 (24 August 2011)

"Do The Right Thing" ended with two quotations from Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X. According to King, no circumstances could justify the use of violence but Malcolm X qualified violence as 'intelligence' when in case of self-defense. Three years later, Spike Lee's biopic confirmed the bias he had toward the Muslim leader's opinion and through a masterstroke of writing, provided an insightful explanation on the 'violence/intelligence' controversial equation.
Like Malcolm X, Spike Lee immediately inspires negative reactions, in his depiction of racial realities, but only truth hurts, and any form of thinking is subversive or is not. Rarely inclined to neutrality, Lee points his finger on the pervert aspect of American Society that tends to judge the hate before judging the hate that produces the hate. In other words, Lee provocatively invites you to think why the opening image of a burning American Flag, shocked you most than the sight of a KKK cross burning in front of a Black family house.
Malcolm's family was destroyed by racism, from the roots. Malcolm's mother inherited a light skin from a white man who raped her mother and as a rejection to her 'shameful' genes; she married a Minister with darker complexion. Malcolm's father was killed by the KKK and then killed again, symbolically, when his widow couldn't benefit from his two life insurance policies because the death was considered a suicide. She ended in a mental hospital. These painful wounds in Malcolm's heart forged his determination and encouraged him less to hate than to challenge white men with their very weapons, except for education. Malcolm proved to have a brilliant inclination for studies, but was advised to look for a more manual work. Malcolm abandoned his dreams of accomplishment  through a regular job.
The movie opens with an unexpected gangster feel where Malcolm, a youthful looking Denzel Washington, is a small time hoodlum in an elegant zoot suit, with his inseparable friend and occasional hairdresser, Shorty, played by Spike Lee, together, they drink, they dance and seduce white women. Shorty regularly applies a softening lotion on Malcolm's hair with an immediate burning effect. This running gag reinforces Malcolm's rejection of his condition as a black man and eagerness to imitate the enemy to outperform his. His reddish hair establishes some natural dispositions whose pinnacle is reached with the ultimate middle finger gesture to the system: the blonde. In a memorable scene, Malcolm asks his girl to kiss his feet. The macho power he exudes is so powerful she just can't say no, this is not a man degrading a woman, but a man raising himself to his personal vision of self-accomplishment.
Malcolm still has the charisma of Spike Lee's street-wise characters; something needs to get him to the stature we know. The key is education. When Malcolm is arrested and spends seven years in jail, he's initiated by one of the 'Nation of Islam' followers. Malcolm embraces Islam and develop a passion for reading and knowledge, his glasses and shorter hair transfigures his rebirth as an intellectual figure. Beyond the tremendous performance of Denzel Washington, Lee's thought-provoking script portrays the vitality of education for the Black movement, an indirect way to point out that the segregation was maintained because white men kept black poor and ignorant. Violence was intelligence as self-defense because violence was awareness. "We didn't land on Plymouth Rock, Plymouth Rock landed on us" The Black were not American because they didn't choose their destiny, their condition is the consequences of undesired actions, therefore, Black must take the lead of their destiny again. The price of this self-awareness was indeed a true hate against the White.
In a short but significant scene, a young white woman asked Malcolm if she could do anything to his cause. Malcolm dryly replies 'no', leaving her totally embarrassed, as she felt, she was one of the White devils. As a follower of 'the honorable' Elijah Muhammad, remarkably played by Al Freeman Jr., Malcolm X's aura is stuck in the narrow walls of an orthodox sect-like organization. He studies more than anyone; he marries Betty, Angela Bassett in a powerful supporting role, founds a family, and dedicates his life to his cause. He starts to outshine the Master, and his own allegiance deteriorates when he learns about Elijah's accusation of fornication with his secretaries. Elijah justifying the actions as a God's prophet blasphemes the most sacred Islamic principle and reveals the alienation governing the Nation of Islam. After many ideological disagreements, Malcolm X quits and founds his own association. He signed his own death warrant by acting alone, but this is the great men's existential mark, the ability to act in total integrity.
Through a pivotal pilgrimage to Mecca, he discovered that many cultures, colors of skins, and civilizations embraced Islam, and the Black vs. White antagonism became meaningless. At this point, maybe, Malcolm X understood that the fight, as necessary as it was, was only meant to restore pride and dignity to the African American. But Malcolm X was so blinded by a skin based antagonism that he didn't want to admit the possibility that he could be respected more by a white than a black man, or that a black man could kill him. History judged Malcolm X more harshly than Martin Luther King who was more a sort of Gandhi-like figure, but even King's peaceful nature didn't spare his life.
King was a humanist, X was lucid, as carrying the light. His assassination didn't make him a martyr, but a legend whose pride speaks to all the black conscience in the world. "I am Malcolm X" shouts school-kids at the end of the film while the tribute from Ossie Davis is heard, every African American carries the heritage of a man who didn't reject a country but injected a dignity, intelligence, a pride that transcended any form of religious beliefs.