SPIKE LEE: Do the Right Thing (1989)
“Always do the right thing.”
CONTENT WARNING: Discussion of police murders, police brutality, racism, sex, racial tension, alcoholism.
Our Spike Lee series continues with, perhaps, Spike’s greatest movie and only his third full-length feature. It’s a movie so poignant and real that it can literally change lives, and we don’t say that lightly. Of course, Hollywood was terrified it would incite violence and rioting, which is preposterous because its real message is how to navigate living together, both in peace and violence. Spike doesn’t ask easy questions and doesn’t expect easy answers; he just wants to lay it all out in front of us. And, in the meantime, he gives us a whole crew of unique, well-drawn characters that, even when caricatures, still show a sense of the real world and all of its struggles. Wake up, wake up, up you wake and join us as we watch 1989’s masterpiece Do the Right Thing, this week on Macintosh & Maud Haven’t Seen What?!
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Intro music taken from the Second Movement of Ludwig von Beethoven's 9th Symphony. Licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Hong Kong (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0 HK) license. To hear the full performance or get more information, visit the song page at the Internet Archive.
Excerpt taken from “Fight the Power” from the soundtrack to the movie Do the Right Thing, written by Carlton Ridenhour, Eric Sadler, Hank Shocklee and Keith Shocklee and performed by Public Enemy. Copyright 1989 Universal City Studios, Inc.; Motown Record Company, L.P.
Excerpts taken from the movie Do the Right Thing, copyright 1989 Universal City Studios, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Excerpt taken from the 1990 Academy Awards with a speech from Kim Basinger.
Excerpt taken from “Mo’ Better Blues” from the soundtrack to the movie Mo’ Better Blues, written by Bill Lee and performed by the Branford Marsalis Quartet featuring Terence Blanchard. Copyright 1990 CBS Records Inc.
