Short Take: Do the Right Thing

Do the Right Thing, written and directed by Spike Lee, is one of the most ambitious films of the 1980s. It is also one of the most accomplished. The story is set on a block in Bedford-Stuyvesant, a predominantly African-American neighborhood in Brooklyn, New York. It's a punishingly hot Saturday in August. Lee, working in an impressionistic slice-of-life mode, follows the comings-and-goings of a multitude of characters from that morning until early the next day. He entertainingly renders the friendly sides of their relationships, but he also captures the tensions between them, which come to the fore as ego battles of varying degree. The conflicts frequently have a racial dimension. The Italian-Americans who own and operate a pizzeria, the Korean-Americans who run a corner store, the white yuppie who recently bought a local brownstone--all become a target of hostility from African-Americans in the neighborhood, and they often give as good as they get. Most of the confrontations are minor: they briefly swell and then recede, and everyone goes about their business. But that night, one of these petty stand-offs escalates into violence. When it ends, there are only losers: a man is dead, and a business has been destroyed. Lee, with remarkable artistry, dramatizes the subtlety with which racial hostility can pervade everyday life, and how the violence it occasionally inspires can seem to erupt out of nowhere. The film is startlingly incisive, and one may find oneself mulling it over for some time after the closing credits roll. The acting ensemble--Lee himself, Danny Aiello, Ossie Davis, Ruby Dee, Richard Edson, Giancarlo Esposito, Samuel L. Jackson, Bill Nunn, Rosie Perez, John Savage, John Turturro, and others--is outstanding. Ernest Dickerson's cinematography powerfully captures the sweltering summer atmosphere. Bill Lee, the director's father, contributed the fine jazz score.