I am rooting for BlacKkKlansman..film knocked me out....in so many ways....
BlacKkKlansman with its true-ish interpretation of Ron Stallworth’s time as an undercover cop – and its potent mix of historical fact and fiction, style, swagger and unpicking of current political ideology means its the obvious choice for this year’s best picture Oscar. Lee took inspiration from The French Connection, Dog Day Afternoon and Serpico, and for a director whose greatest work has never been acknowledged by the Academy, there would be something fitting in him finally getting recognition for a work that is simultaneously iconoclastic, more racially charged than ever and rooted in the very best of 70s cinema.
Yes, Boots Riley has a valid point that the true story of Ron Stallworth was very different to the one that Lee presents. But the counter argument is that a film which is presented as being “based upon some fo’ real, fo’ real shit” should be taken with a healthy pinch of salt. And, anyway, the film’s best moments all mix reality and fiction to glorious effect. There’s Lee’s presentation of civil rights activist Kwame Ture, who Stallworth really did meet and who is played by a career-best Corey Hawkins. There’s the masterstroke of using Harry Belafonte to appear as Jerome Turner, a made-up character who tells the Colorado students about the very real lynching of Jesse Washington in Waco, Texas, is one of Lee’s very best and is an important piece of storytelling that lingers long after the credits roll. Then there’s the film’s coup de theatre: the interspersing of real-life footage of the Charlottesville neo-Nazi rally, a joyous David Duke and Donald Trump’s conflation of anti-fascist protests with the far right groups that swamped the town.
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