MO' BETTER BLUES

Cole's Rating: ★★★

Director: Spike Lee
Year: 1990
Cast: Denzel Washington, Wesley Snipes, Spike Lee
Genre: Drama/Music
MPAA Rating: R

        Director Spike Lee explores different atypical portions of reality in each one of his films. In 25th Hour, he dove into post 9/11, crime riddled NYC. In Clockers, he divulged life of 24 hour drug pushers and cops in “the projects”. In Mo’ Better Blues, he introduces the life of a self-centered jazz player who tends to have problems with relationships. I went into this movie thinking I was going to enjoy it (if for no other reason) because I, too, am a jazz musician. When I realized that this film isn’t about jazz at all, I was taken aback but I wasn’t aggravated. I was interested. Mo’ Better Blues clearly isn’t the most entertaining film and it definitely has a lot of flaws. Despite this, it is a thoughtful, relatively well done character study that manages to incorporate a lot of immersive musicality (kudos' to Lee’s father) and one that packs in a great performance. That’s why I like and recommend Mo’ Better Blues.

        It's evident why Spike Lee is known as a director and not an actor. Every scene that he was in suffered unless Denzel Washington took over (which he did quite a bit). He either tries to overplay his role, or just doesn’t know how to do it at all because the scenes that centered mainly around his character were just plain laughable. If I were him, I would’ve muttered my line, and looked over at Denzel to finish up, because Lee lacks serious acting chops. But then, one of the flaws of this film, besides Lee’s attempt to act, is how the story relies on Washington to do the heavy lifting. Recasting (Lee) or getting some other heavy-hitting actors to carry out some scenes were all options to better this film by a great deal.

        But overall, this movie is one that requires a lot of thought for the main character. Though his actions may not make sense at times, I felt like I knew Bleak (Washington) very well. The movie does a nice job of not making him come off as a total jerk; I felt like he was victimized. I empathized with him. That’s more than what I can say for other of Lee’s works that, while they may be less flawed, aren’t necessarily better. While it does take a little while to get there, the conclusion to this thing is a brilliant correspondence with the opening scene; it provokes thought, comparison, and wonder. It resonates, to be sure. It isn’t a big twist, but it sure is enough to cap off a solid entry into Spike Lee’s filmmaking endeavors.

-Written by Cole Pollyea