Do the Right Thing (1989)

User Rating:

7.9/10   

Director:

Spike Lee

Writer:

Spike Lee (written by)

Release Date:

30 June 1989 (USA)

Genre:

Comedy | Drama

Tagline:

It's the hottest day of the summer. You can do nothing, you can do something, or you can...

Plot:

On the hottest day of the year on a street in the Bedford-Stuyvesant section of Brooklyn, everyone's hate and bigotry smolders and builds until it explodes into violence.

Plot Keywords:

Bedford Stuyvesant | Violence | Street | Hate | Pizzeria

Awards:

Nominated for 2 Oscars. Another 11 wins & 6 nominations

Cast

Danny Aiello	...	Sal
Ossie Davis	...	Da Mayor
Ruby Dee	...	Mother Sister
Richard Edson	...	Vito
Giancarlo Esposito	...	Buggin Out
Spike Lee	...	Mookie
Bill Nunn	...	Radio Raheem
John Turturro	...	Pino
Paul Benjamin	...	ML
Frankie Faison	...	Coconut Sid
Robin Harris	...	Sweet Dick Willie
Joie Lee	...	Jade
Miguel Sandoval	...	Officer Ponte
Rick Aiello	...	Officer Long
John Savage	...	Clifton

Runtime:

120 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English | Italian | Spanish

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby SR

Certification:

New Zealand:M | Iceland:12 | Netherlands:16 | Australia:R | Portugal:M/12 | France:Unrated | Argentina:16 | Canada:13+ (Quebec) | Canada:18A | Chile:18 | Finland:K-16 | Norway:11 (cinema release) | Norway:15 | South Korea:18 | Sweden:15 | UK:18 | USA:R | West Germany:12 | Singapore:M18

Filming Locations:

Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn, New York City, New York, USA

Company:

40 Acres & A Mule Filmworks

Trivia:

Radio Raheem's (Bill Nunn) description of his four finger rings (Love and Hate) is a homage to Rev. Harry Powell (Robert Mitchum) in to The Night of the Hunter (1955)

Goofs:

Continuity: In the final scene, when Sal throws $500 to Mookie, he throws five bills, and Mookie throws two back at him. When Mookie goes to pick the money up again, he picks up two bills, but two more are visible in the frame, lying on the ground.

Quotes:

[first lines]
Mister Senor Love Daddy: Wake up! Wake up! Up you wake!

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas (2004) (VG)

Soundtrack:

Lift Every Voice and Sing

excellent drama with a message

If I had to make a list of the top ten things that I find most boring, racism would be right at the summit along with economics and The Blair Witch Project. For that reason, I have avoided Do the Right Thing up until now for fear that it would be a lecture on racism...but actually, I don't know what I was afraid of, as this film is really good. Spike Lee's racial drama is actually more a film about the feebleness of racial divides and how violence only breeds violence, as opposed to a film ABOUT racism. In fact, the film can be best described as a cinematic materialisation of Martin Luther King's famous "an eye for an eye leaves everybody blind" speech.

For this movie, Spike Lee has put together a terrific cast, that includes many actors that have gone on to become big names in the movie industry, people such as Samuel L. Jackson, John Turturro and Martin Lawrence, not to mention smaller stars such as Ossie Davis. The cast comes together excellently and the neighbourhood that Spike Lee has created for this film feels very real, and through the multiple personalities that inhabit it, it manages to stay interesting and realistic throughout. The atmosphere of the neighbourhood is also of note, and you really do get the feeling that someone could say 'biatch' or 'dogg' at any time. Spike Lee delights in showing us many different people, and at different times - including their reactions to certain events and their interactions with each other, and it all helps to build up both their own characters and the neighbourhood that they live in. This proves to be invaluable to the film as it has no real plot and therefore relies on the characters and the neighbourhood that it has created to build itself, it's scenario and therefore it's message, up.

Do the Right Thing is a portrait of how multiple cultures live together in modern day America and it also succeeds in being a stark and potent portrayal of how violence never gets anyone anywhere. Spike Lee has shown his talents as an actor, director and a writer with this film, and even though majority opinion of him seems to be that he's a disagreeable old crone; at least he's one that has talent.