It was the best of (movie) times... Do the Right Thing

[NOTE:  the second clip is NOT safe for workplaces or children.]

The events of Do the Right Thing take place over one day in the Bedford-Stuyvesant section of Brooklyn on the hottest day of the year.  The heat causes everyone's hatred to smolder until it explodes at the end of the day.  Mostly, the movie follows Mookie, a pizza delivery boy around the area, introducing us to the local population.  Notably, Buggin Out (the angry black man), Radio Raheem (a large young man with a boombox continually blasting out Public Enemies "Fight the Power"), Jade (Mookie's younger sister, a pulled together well spoken young lady), Tina (Mookie's girl and mother of his son), Da Mayor (old drunk), Sister Mother (old wise woman), Master Senior Love Daddy (the DJ on the air for 12 hours everyday), Sal (the owner of Sal's Famous Pizzeria and Mookie's boss), Sal's two sons (Vitto and Pino, both also employed at Sal's), and MANY other characters.  I normally wouldn't list all these, but I just wanted you to understand the scope of the cast in this story.  The main conflict begins when Buggin Out tells Sal to put some pictures of African Americans on his Wall of Fame.  As Sal owns the business, he tells him ONLY Italian Americans.  Buggin Out, well, bugs out and gets himself booted from the place.  He spends most of the rest of the day trying to organize a boycott of Sal's.  Later, Radio Raheem walks into the pizzeria with his boombox blaring.  When Sal yells at him to turn it off, he is angered as well.  Buggin Out and Radio Raheem team up and storm the pizzeria when Sal is kind enough to open his doors to a few kids for last minute slices.  Raheem blares his boombox and Buggin Out says that they will stay there until Sal agrees to put the pictures of African Americans on the wall.  Sal gets fed up and threatens them with a baseball bat, but instead of roughing the kids up, he uses the bat to "kill" the boombox.  Raheem, enraged, attacks Sal, dragging him outside.  Even though many try to break it up, it takes the police to finally stop Raheem.  HOWEVER, things go completely upside down when one of the police officers kills Raheem in front of the entire neighborhood.  Mookie, distraught, throws a trash can through the window of the pizzeria, starting a riot focused on Sal's Famous Pizzeria.  The mob ends up burning the place down in front of Sal and his sons.  The movie ends the next day, with Mookie going to get his pay from Sal and life moving on.

THAT was just scratching the surface.  There are a few more side plots.  That was only the main conflict.  But lots of conflicts occur all day.  For instance, Pino is terribly racist and doesn't bother to hide it.  Tina is constantly on Mookie to spend more time with her, even becoming enraged when Mookie has to work.  Jade wants Mookie to move out and take care of his responsibilities.  There are a trio of older African American men, one of them hates the fact that a family of Koreans opened a grocery, and no African Americans own a business in their neighborhood.  Sister Mother doesn't like Da Mayor because he drinks too much.  All of this is over seen by Mister Senior Love Daddy, who (in my opinion) is God.  Everyone seems to have a bigoted hatred for someone (resulting in an uncomfortably comical moment in the middle of the movie).

Do the Right Thing is really something to look at.  There is a red tint to everything and many shots have heat waves rising from the pavement.  Everyone is sweaty and on edge.  The audience is really dragged into this sweltering day, just from the visuals.  Every character has a unique voice and tone, kind of a task as there are so many characters to flesh out.  Spike Lee also opts to use so many strange angles and shots, accenting the feel of each scene.  The movie is dramatic, comical, and just downright uncomfortable when it needs to be.

This is not my first time watching this movie.  In fact I have seen it three times prior to this.  It was one of the movies that I had to watch for a film class in college.  Our weekly assignment was to answer a question in a one page essay.  The question for this movie (and yes, I remember it very clearly) was "Why did Mookie do what he did?"  I didn't know after watching it in class.  So I rented it, and watched it at home.  I still didn't know how to answer.  So I watched it with my boyfriend at the time (thinking that HE possibly could have some insight), I STILL didn't know how to answer.  I ended up turning in a page of b.s. just so I could complete the assignment.  After having watched it again, I think that the question is unfair to require only a page to answer.  There is WAY too much going into this one action (Mookie throwing the trash can, just in case I lost you there) to condense it to only a page.  Mookie is in a pressure cooker, and the heat wave added the missing ingredient.  Raheem was killed and everyone went crazy for a while.  Hmmm.... I just sort of did it in a few sentences... I guess I could have done it... But I doubt it.  I don't have to support it the way I needed to then.

Do the Right Thing is a well produced movie.  A well written movie.  A well acted movie.  And I really don't think that I want to see it again.  It ends on a sort of helpless note.  Like a "why???"  It's a good movie to show what bigotry over years can do, given a catalyst.  But, it isn't designed to make you feel good.  It is designed to make you think.  To show what a mob of people is capable of.  I am not sure what side Spike Lee falls on, even.  The end credits have two quotes, one that condemns violence in any form from Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr and one that justifies SOME violence from Malcom X.  So, yeah.  I think I need to go think about the state of the world now...

GGC