FISTS UP!!: a review of "Da 5 Bloods"

"DA 5 BLOODS"

Screenplay Written by Danny Bilson & Paul De Meo and Spike Lee & Kevin Willmott
Directed by Spike Lee
**** (four stars)

RATED R

Mammoth. Absolutely mammoth.

I have expressed the following sentiments many times upon this blogsite and I am compelled to say it all over again: Writer/Producer/Director Spike Lee is one of our greatest living American filmmakers. Period. And as emphatically as he would say himself...Dats Da Truth, Ruth!!!

Dear readers, I have often been, and still remain just slack jawed and open mouthed when I regard Spike Lee's complete filmography and realize over and again how the immense quality of the work is so staggeringly, uncommonly high. No, not every film is a masterpiece and there have been quite a few of his films that have underwhelmed, or were decidedly flawed and there is even one that is downright repugnant (no need to go into that one any further) but film by film, year after year, from his narrative features, to his documentaries and filmed presentations of stage productions, Spike Lee has delivered his art from a skill and passion that is often as unparalleled as it is unquestionable and uncompromising. And believe me, when he finds himself at his most determined, and within his most fearlessly artistic sweet spot, he is untouchable. 

After a period of films that seemed to find Lee in a more wayward and seeking frame of mind, with experimental films that never quite jelled to their fullest fruition, he has since been fueling his art profoundly, while performing a certain creative re-ascension. From the audacious outrage of his searing gun violence epidemic satire "Chi-Raq" (2015), to the sprawling, spectacular two-season television re-invention of his own "She's Gotta Have It (2017-2019), the blistering and Oscar winning "BlacKKKlansman" (2018) and the sobering, sorrowful filmed stage production of "Pass Over" (2018), Spike Lee has been taking grander steps upwards and onwards and now, he has emerged with one of the best films he has ever made. 

With the arrival of "Da 5 Bloods," Spike Lee's latest "Joint," we are given an experience that is nothing less than colossal. It is a film that scales to the rarefied heights of his greatest film achievements, both "Do The Right Thing" (1989) and "Malcolm X" (1992), while again serving as a work that feels of a piece with the bulk of his oeuvre as it simultaneously blazes into uncharted territory. It is a staggering, volcanic experience. A voluminous, multi-faceted, multi-layered expression that utilizes its story, characters, social/political outlook and activism plus a creatively conceptual arsenal of film styles, history and genres to dive deeply into the core of the African-American military veteran experience.

 

Courtesy of the vibrant exploration of Black male brotherhood as human beings as well as soldiers, Lee delivers an impassioned, furious follow up to his own World War II set "Miracle At St. Anna" (2008)  as he holds up the dichotomy of Black men fighting for and holding upright the patriotism for a nation that has been systematically engineered to outright deny our humanity. It is a film that honors our veterans and history and even moreso and most powerfully, the film speaks precisely to this very minute in 2020. Without any hyperbole whatsoever, I am urgently, as just as passionately extolling to you that Spike Lee's "Da 5 Bloods" is essential viewing of the highest order.

Opening with an astounding mosaic of the activist voices of Muhammad Ali, Malcolm X, Angela Davis, Kwame Ture and Bobby Seale, combined with the turbulent sights of the violence on American soil (Kent State, Jackson State, Democratic National Convention, instances of police brutality) alongside Vietnam war atrocities, all of which is brilliantly scored by Marvin Gaye's "Inner City Blues (Make Me Wanna Holler)," Spike Lee's "Da 5 Bloods" begins in earnest in 21st century Vietnam, as we are introduced to Vietnam war veterans Paul (Delroy Lindo), Otis (Clarke Peters), Eddie (Norm Lewis) and Melvin (Isiah Whitlock Jr.).

The quartet has reunited and returned to Vietnam for an intensely special and impassioned mission: to collect the remains of their fallen and beloved Squadron Leader, "Stormin' Norman Holloway (Chadwick Boseman) as well as to locate millions of dollars worth of gold bars the group hid during the war, but has been previously unable to re-locate due to the shifting topography suffered from  Napalm bombings.

Their odyssey, during which the foursome are either joined by or cross paths with their tour guide Vihn (Johnny Tri Nguyen), Otis' old flame, Tien (Le Y Lan), Mr. Desroche (Jean Reno), a duplicitous French businessman, a trio of philanthropic landmine cleaners named Hedy Bouvier (Melanie Thierry), Seppo Havelin (Jasper Paakkonen) and Simon (Paul Walter Hauser), and finally, Paul's adult son David (Jonathan Majors), Da Bloods are forced to fully confront their on-going demons from their chaotic past within an even more chaotic present, which may either strengthen their decades long bond or unravel it entirely.

I cannot over-state enough about what a triumph Spike Lee's "Da 5 Bloods" is, as he has so skillfully and miraculously blended a variety of genres and film aesthetics to tell this one vehemently fiery, feverish story of a criminally under-represented group of people within film: the African-American soldier. 

What Lee has delivered contains certain cinematic roots within the likes of John Huston's "The Treasure Of The Sierra Madre" (1948), David Lean's "The Bridge On The River Kwai" (1957) and most certainly, Francis Ford Coppola's "Apocalypse Now" (1979), as well as that film's inspiration, Joseph Conrad's novella Heart Of Darkness (1899) while also sharing significant conceptual bonds within Lee's own filmography, including "Get On The Bus" (1996), "He Got Game" (1998), "Inside Man" (2006), "Red Hook Summer" (2012) and the aforementioned "Miracle At St. Anna" and "BlacKKKlansman." 

To that end, "Da 5 Bloods" is simultaneously an experience that possess the heft and skill to function as a war movie, heist film, action thriller, a western, a history lesson, a primal Father/son drama, and at its deepest importance, the film is poignant psychological portrait of Black soldiers from torment and regret, to shame and horror, and hopefully, redemption to spiritual deliverance. Lee, under the leadership of his propulsive, evocative direction, accomplishes this tremendous feat from end-to-end via his beautifully conceived screenplay, written by himself and his frequent collaborator, Writer/Director and University of Kansas Film Professor Kevin Willmott, plus the booming, elegiac score from Lee film scoring veteran Composer Terence Blanchard, the stunning Cinematography from Newton Thomas Sigel, which captures the full breadth of the story through a variety of film aspect ratios (from full screen, to letterbox widescreen, to grainy 16MM), the ghostly song score which features much of Marvin Gaye's "What's Going On" (released May 21, 1971) and with the greatest sense of empathy, depth and soul stirring energy, the pitch perfect performances of the entire cast, especially Delroy Lindo who scales heights of which I have never, ever seen from him before.  

Even with all of the previously mentioned comparisons, if there is any film that "Da 5 Bloods" reminded me of most--or at least, the film in which it felt to share the closest company, it was with Michael Cimino's iconic "The Deer Hunter" (1978), as Spike Lee also provides the full arc in largely three sections of before, during and the aftermath of the events of their Vietnam experience and how this period shaped and altered the lives of the film's core characters--and sometimes this phenomenon occurs all in the same scene and sequences. I absolutely loved how Lee utilized his actors during the 1960's/1970's Vietnam War sections of the film at their current ages and without any de-aging CGI special effects technology. This was an absolutely brilliant technique, whether by intention or design (due to the costly nature of special effects technology), as it is illustrating, in a most harrowing factor, how the war has remained with the surviving members of the squadron through the decades and how even in their memories and nightmares, their current age reflects how intertwined the war remains within their minds and souls. 

Through this aspect, Lee also continues his deftly bewildering ability to make the events of the past so shockingly and rightfully present. Additionally, his always excellent usage of music serves as an additional character, enhancing the story and psychology of the characters (who incidentally are all named after the members of the original Temptations plus Producer Norman Whitfield). The glistening voice of Marvin Gaye functions as a spiritual and psychological extension of these characters and their experiences, ghosts of the past walking side by side with them in the present. And there is no greater ghost than of their fallen brother-in-arms, Stormin' Norman.  

As described by Otis, Stormin' Norman is an expert soldier, a rare Black Squadron Leader in a White man's military who functioned as being part Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and part Malcolm X and through Spike Lee's unapologetically militant cinematic eye, Norman is also a bit of Huey P. Newton as well as a dash of the fictional John Shaft. 

Obviously, it would have to be our very own "Black Panther" to portray such a war hero and Chadwick Boseman perfectly embodies the swagger and grit, certainly but also the psychology to understand the hypocrisy of how Black people accounted for 11% of the United States population yet over 30% were fighting on the front lines to protect the very rights we were not allowed to fully attain for ourselves due to historical, systemic racism. His plot for hiding the gold his troop found, gold designated as payment from the US to the Vietnamese for their aid in fighting the Viet Cong, is a means to provide a sense of reparations in honor of all of the sacrificed Black lives that did not ever matter to the United States Of America, whether within the military, the criminal justice system, and most personally, within the very police back in the USA patrolling Black neighborhoods as a means of maintaining the power dynamic and structure rather than protecting and serving the public. 

One especially hypnotic and multi-layered sequence--and one that is clearly an echo to the "Axis Sally" sequence in Lee's "Miracle At St. Anna"--features the captivating voice of Vietnamese propagandist radio DJ Hanoi Hannah (an excellent Veronica Ngo) whose broadcasts inform Da 5 Bloods of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and that while they are there in the Vietnam jungles, their neighborhoods back home in the USA are on fire. 

As Hanoi Hannah speaks truths of how White American wars serve to use and discard Black lives for their own purposes, Stormin' Norman is a source of inspiration and strength for the other four members of Da 5 Bloods, solely holding them together as Black men, refusing to allow either White and/or Vietnamese subterfuge as a means to manipulate rightful and righteous Black rage. Norman understands the paradox and hold the unit together for a hopeful patriotism, even when the nation they fight for is drenched in racism. And yet, it is his death during the war that sends the team into its individualistic and collective anguish, both strengthening and fracturing their bonds, haunting them for decades afterwards.

"War is about money. Money is about war." Those words, uttered by Stormin' Norman, echo through the film via the actions of the remaining Bloods as they venture back into the jungles and terrains of Vietnam with hopes of finding the gold. Whatever altruistic ambitions they once held have since been fractured as have clear divisions have been formulated between Eddie, who only wants to honor Norm's original plans, possibly for his own sense of redemption and the consumed with anger, self-pity and most PTSD afflicted Paul, who just, finally, wants what is coming to him after a lifetime of disappointments and tragedies. 

And it is here where I have to turn my fullest attention to the performance of Delroy Lindo. 

Now...I have to digress for a moment as I feel the need to describe to you a moment I once saw on an episode of "Inside The Actor's Studio" on which Martin Sheen appeared a guest. During a discussion about "Apocalypse Now," Sheen informed host James Lipton (R.I.P.) and the audience that an early scene in the film where his character was experiencing a mental breakdown, was in fact a sequence during which he was not acting but was in the state of being as he himself was then an alcoholic and underwent a very real mental breakdown (which then preceded his heart attack later in the shoot). Sheen allowed Francis Ford Coppola to just film and film, and what was attained--from Sheen breaking a mirror with his bare hands, leaving his fist bloody to writhing around the hotel room floor set, naked and howling in what is clearly existential pain--was a real as life capture of a soul in crisis.

I bring up that story to speak of the performance delivered by Delroy Lindo, for he, as Paul, takes us to Hell and even deeper with an existential roar that is shattering to witness. This is not to suggest that Lindo was not acting, per se. But, for all of his excellent work in his history, especially within Spike Lee's "Malcolm X," "Crooklyn" (1994) and "Clockers" (1995), Delroy Lindo presents himself in a state of being that I was fully unprepared to see from him. This is a performance to behold. This is a performance for the ages. 

As Paul, Delroy Lindo gives to us a portrait of a powerful, hulking Black man so desperately lost. A man lost in rage and sorrow, furious at the world and demons both real and imagined plus enduring the loss of Norm during the war, and the ensuing bottomless grief, has clearly affected him the most as Norm was his anchor as well as his most trusted friend. Shockingly, Paul has emerged in 2020 as a MAGA hat wearing Trump voter and supporter, adorning the red baseball cap throughout the film (itself a metaphor), while his feral paranoia in 21st century Vietnam grows and spreads, as witnessed in a stellar sequence when he experiences a panic attack in a Vietnamese floating market. As the film continues onwards, with the brotherhood of Da Bloods continuously tested, Paul, the self-described "broken" man descends further into despair and fury filled madness. In short, he is the Da Bloods' Colonel Kurtz.

In addition to the mounting tension between himself and the more even keeled Otis (who due to his nature is the team's medic and therefore, its healer), as well as his PTSD concerning his mourning over Norman, the primary conflict for Paul lies within his brutally painful relationship with his son David, which wavers rapidly between protection and outright rejection, and is entirely abusive.     

Through the film and as Paul descends, Delroy Lindo, by contrast, ascends. By the film's final third, Lindo unleashes not one, not two but three devastating monologues that will blind you with their determination and unstoppable force and fragility. We see the history of Paul in Delroy Lindo, where we are able to mentally fill in the blanks as to the character's life trajectory, where we can understand how he may have journeyed from A to B. How he could remain racially conscious and have become a Trump supporter. How he could hold a maelstrom of emotions towards his son. Everything exists upon Delroy Linod's face, eyes, imposing frame and also, his voice, which he stretches and contorts in ways to reveal Paul's suffering. I have no idea of where he unearthed this from but Delroy Lindo OWNS the role in a way where I can imagine that even Spike Lee himself would have been downright amazed at  his good fortune to have cast him.

And even then, Spike Lee continues to fill his film in an grandly, epic style as his fair mindedness allows his main characters to be multi-layered and to also allow time for the Vietnamese characters to express themselves and share their sense of history with the war. On an aesthetic level, Lee more than proves himself with his adeptness and agility with action sequences with are all harrowing, filled with shocks and rightfully graphic, even grisly yet not gratuitous violence. And even then, Lee assures us that "Da 5 Bloods" contains humor, that it contains romance, that it contains sheer joy as the narrative stops completely just to have us observe and embrace Da Bloods in a rare moment of euphoric camaraderie as they dance their way through a Vietnamese nightclub to Marvin Gaye's "Got To Give It Up Part 1."  It is a film so complete as to be overflowing and the result is rewarding to the highest order.

Since the film's release upon Netflix, I have had the inspiration and opportunity to watch this film three times in full, each time knocking me backwards in its power. I have no idea of what any sort of awards season is going to even look like but Spike Lee's "Da 5 Bloods" deserves any and all honors that should be flying in its direction. By this point, you are certain to realize that this film is going to be exceedingly tough to top as my favorite film of 2020. 

But, what you may not know, yet I am mere words away from sharing with you is that when the time comes to compile my Time Capsule series commemorating the best films of the decade between 2020-2029, Spike Lee's "Da 5 Bloods" has firmly earned its place upon that compilation.