For the most part, the Millennial Generation is composed of hopeless nincompoops whose taste in movies, television and books is so vapid and cretinous that being boiled in oil would be preferable to watching one of their picks.\u00a0 But there are exceptions.\u00a0 I work with a young fellow who has demonstrably received an education that includes many of the elements of the Old School.\u00a0 He has a good grounding in history and science and is acquainted with the western canon of literature.\u00a0 Without a doubt he leans far more to the left than I do but paraphrasing Churchill a man in his twenties who isn\u2019t a liberal has no heart.\u00a0 Well about a week ago we were talking about crime dramas and he asked me whether I like the \u201ccaper\u201d movie genre.\u00a0 I assumed he was going to mention Ocean\u2019s Eleven or a Guy Ritchie film.\u00a0 But he said it was a movie with Denzel Washington as a New York City Police Detective negotiating a hostage crisis during an abortive bank robbery.\u00a0 It sounded interesting.\u00a0 I like many of Washington\u2019s movies.\u00a0 As an expat New Yorker, I\u2019m sort of a pushover for New York City stories so I was interested.\u00a0 But then he said it was a Spike Lee film.<\/p>\n
I had never, up to that point, watched a Spike Lee \u201cjoint.\u201d\u00a0 I consider him a race hustler who has built his reputation by fanning the flames of black animosity toward white people.\u00a0 All in all, I consider him a jerk.<\/p>\n
In my reaction to my young friend\u2019s suggestion I mentioned these feelings.\u00a0 He did his best to assure me that this was a pure crime drama without any hint of racial justice propagandizing.\u00a0 Based on his past track record of good sense, I begrudgingly decided to give it a shot.<\/p>\n
So last night I watched it.\u00a0 It was good.\u00a0 It was very good.\u00a0 Full disclosure, there were a few minor race hectoring flourishes that added nothing to the story.\u00a0 But they did little to harm the story either.\u00a0 I looked at them as involuntary reflexes that Spike Lee probably didn\u2019t even know he\u2019d added.\u00a0 But they were minor and didn\u2019t spoil the story.<\/p>\n
The movie is a very good caper.\u00a0 I won\u2019t spoil any of the plot but will just say that there are lots of balls in the air and several interesting major characters and lots of minor characters doing interesting things.\u00a0 Denzel is the star of the movie outside of the bank and Clive Owen is the star inside the bank.\u00a0 Other relatively big-name actors are Christopher Plummer, Jody Foster and Willem Dafoe.\u00a0 Washington\u2019s cop partner is played by Chiwetel Ejiofor whom I know from his role as \u201cThe Operative\u201d in \u201cSerenity.\u201d\u00a0 And lots other unknowns do good work as the hostages, cops and criminals.<\/p>\n
So, knowing that Spike Lee made this picture does detract from my enjoyment of the film. \u00a0I begrudge the African music he adds at the beginning and end.\u00a0 I take points off for those flourishes of racial sniping I mentioned above.\u00a0 But after all that I am forced to admit it\u2019s a very good caper film.\u00a0 I recommend it to anyone who likes this genre.\u00a0 It\u2019s highly enjoyable and skillfully constructed.\u00a0 Well done Spike Lee?<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
[socialpoll id=”2489142″]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
For the most part, the Millennial Generation is composed of hopeless nincompoops whose taste in movies, television and books is so vapid and cretinous that<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[239,237],"tags":[794,793,43,38],"class_list":["post-2295","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-movie-reviews","category-reviews","tag-clive-owen","tag-denzel-washington","tag-movie-review","tag-review"],"yoast_head":"\n