Highest 2 Lowest

I loved seeing Spike Lee and Denzel Washington teaming up again for a new film. From start to finish, though, the movie felt scattered-jumping around with no clear plot or objective. As expected, Denzel did his thing and really carried it. A$AP Rocky wasn't bad, and Ilfenesh Hadera held her own, but overall the film was just... okay. At times, it definitely gave off Godfather of Harlem vibes, and it was New York through and through from beginning to end.

Movie Grade:C-/C.

Denzell Washington is a very successful music producer with, as he calls it, "The best ears in the business". He sold off a piece of his corporation a few years back and lives an opulent lifestyle. But the changed economics of the music business, a company sniffing around to buy the company from under him, and a desire to be more of a producer than a businessman have worn on him. He arranges for a loan to buy a block of shares that will give him control. And then his son is kidnapped.

Many of you will recognize this as a remake of Kurosawa's Tengoku to jigoku aka High and Low. As a result, the first big plot twist did not surprise me. What did surprise me was Spike Lee's expansion, not only of the divide between the highest and lowest wealth in the movie -- although that was by making Washington so very rich -- as the expansion of the ending. Several of Kurosawa's movies seem to end abruptly to me, pointlessly so: an ending that shocks rather than concludes. That is, undoubtedly, a cultural difference. But Lee comes down on my side, and with equally stern cultural self-criticism. In doing so, he demonstrates this is a sturdy story, both in terms of its thriller/kidnapping plot and in terms of how societies view art, money, and privilege.

This was a "we made it" film. Spike Lee, Denzel Washington and Jeffrey Wright are far from needing to prove their filmmaking and acting chops, so this was a love letter to New York, Brooklyn and Black art. It's a timely representation of Black men building from the ground up, growing together and being a bridge to the young men (A$AP Rocky) who aspire to become them. The plot fell flat for me, because more could've been done with the characters, especially Jeffrey Wright's role. I watched and became more engrossed in the art collection than the story itself.

Worth a watch especially if you're African American. A lot of the jokes and writing are geared towards our specific culture and will be more relatable/relevant to us. I appreciated the message at the end of the film about modern day rap music and rap culture. Mostly very strong cast except for Pam, if I'm being honest she was the only weak link and the editing didn't do her any favors. Speaking of editing the editing could have been much better, the writing could have been way better he needed a team of people to review his script, star directors like spike lee get way too much creative freedom and aren't held accountable enough for subpar work in my opinion. ASAP Rocky did a beautiful job he had a very complex and real character that could have easily fallen into a stereotypical cliched performance but he brought a lot of humanity to it. Cinematography was okay. Production design looked very VFX even the view from the penthouse looked like a iPad screen. Denzel did what he was supposed to do. He's a always a joy to watch but he deserved a better script and production quality. Overall not bad. But I wouldn't recommend paying money for it in theatres. Wait till it streams.

Expected more from Spike Lee. Very misfitting score that belonged in a Star Wars type film. We don't need loud distracting music over every scene. The double edited shots were also distracting and over done. Bad acting from many of the supporting cast. Slow start, could have easily tightened the edit. This film didn't seem to know what it was. No clear vision. A little preachy. And a kind of dull story line with no twist!