Spike Lee's Chi-raq

xp Rahm met with spike lee about the movie

well if we are to accept that the purpose of the movie -- whether it did this well or not -- was to address the problem of violence in chicago and the problems that underlie it, one might ask what chance, who seems to have opinions about the subject, has been doing to combat the problem, or what kind of politicians he supports to bring about change. if it's true that he hasn't spoken out against rahm, or doesn't support the protest against him, i'd say his family ties to the regime are pretty fair game

afaict the extent of chance's criticism of the movie was a couple of tweets containing some social justice buzzwords. i may have missed a follow-up, though -- please link if he's fleshed his ideas out a little more

xp

otm

It's not even so much about whether the movie does it well as whether it was ever really trying in the first place.

Don't know why Spike Lee gets the botd here wrt his intentions and Chance doesn't.

He's been vocal and active against violence in Chicago and even if his silence regarding the mayor is a valid barb it isn't a relevant one.

His tweets are embedded here.
http://pitchfork.com/news/62395-chance-the-rapper-says-spike-lees-chi-raq-is-exploitive-and-problematic/
If you think, "well your daddy works for the mayor!" is a fair rebuttal to that then idk

Loooooool notm

Xp

so maybe if spike said chance's tweets were problematic and then stopped talking about it

Sorry for glibness, pulling the "well what are YOU doing about the violence" on chance, who's one of the most socially active celebrities to come out of Chicago maybe ever, is just funny to me

so you would agree that his connections to rahm are off-limits, got it

They're completely irrelevant

Like the scene he's from in Chicago was built on the idea of combining Saul alinsky's organizing principles w/ Afrika bambaataa's, it's an extremely socially active and radical scene, chances bff is Malcolm London, the activist whose arrest made national news during the laquan McDonald protests

so maybe if spike said chance's tweets were problematic and then stopped talking about it

― Sufjan Grafton, Friday, 11 December 2015 21:39 (4 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

He's not obliged to defend the movie, but either way what he said was irrelevant.

http://allhiphop.com/2015/12/11/rhymefest-to-spike-lee-support-chicago-filmmakers-or-dont-come-back-to-the-city-video/

“Spike needs to sit down and have a conversation with some people that are really doing work in Chicago instead of just talking sh*t he don’t know about,” stated Rhymefest. “Spike needs to give $100,000 to a program for film development for shorties in Chicago to tell their own story. That’s a challenge that’s issued to him, or just don’t come back to Chicago.”

not sure that those movies would be seen by as many people

Or that they'd even be better.

also not seeing where Jennifer Hudson is saying that she was "tricked to be in the picture"

wasn't aware that rhymefest gets to decide who does and doesn't "come back to Chicago"

so much posturing on all sides in this 'debate'

Rhymefest is a hypocrit but I thought Bonny's response was very thoughtful and insightful

https://www.thefader.com/2015/12/10/lil-bibby-spike-lee-chiraq-real

Lol autocorrect. Bibby's

Bonny "Prince" Bibby

afaict the extent of chance's criticism of the movie was a couple of tweets containing some social justice buzzwords. i may have missed a follow-up, though -- please link if he's fleshed his ideas out a little more

xp

― k3vin k., Friday, December 11, 2015 4:14 PM (5 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

the fuck u talking about

besides "problematic" lol

named the year's best by Richard Brody of the New Yorker

It’s gratifying that Amazon Studios has invested in his vision and restored his work to the prominence that it so greatly deserves. What’s all the more remarkable is that the film that might be called his comeback, “Chi-Raq,” has nothing of the retrospective, nostalgic, or self-righteous about it—it displays an uninhibited freedom of invention. Here, taking huge personal, artistic, and political risks, Lee creates a latter-day masterwork—perhaps his best film to date.

http://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/best-movies-2015

Posted upthread morbs

sorry

different article actually, other one was the original review.

would like to see this.

wow d-40 even being disingenuous as repost policeman, a new low

the color-coded spartans/trojans stuff sounds very baz luhrmann and obviously is not how it Is but movies can and will do many things. a lot of the critical articles i've read (by people who've seen it and not) seem to think that there's some other, realistic, respectful movie someone could make that really would "wake people up" and cause Change. maybe there is. someone should make it. but in my experience sober, polished tragedy reduces to entertainment just as easily as insane satire--easier, actually, because i think a lot of people feel like subjecting themselves to dramatic tragedy is a kind of moral act, and nothing is more entertaining than performing moral acts. like i thought this line in the lil bibby piece (which contains a lot of praise!) was wrong--

It's supposed to make you want to cry. A lot of the stuff that they were doing was funny. Even the whole rhyme scheme, that shit was just stupid. If you see some shit on Chicago, people need to want to cry at the end, not laugh, because it really is sad.

--because i watch moved liberals weep at handsomely mounted injustice almost every weekend, and imo i might as well be projecting porn. (gonna nag the office to get this-- we got dear white people, which the moved liberals did not like, so there's a chance.) no idea if this movie's good or not but i think aggressive, passionate satire is a better way to keep people awake at night than respectful realism--and at the very least not a reason in itself to condemn a movie. (i know there are other reasons it's being condemned--is it about 2015 chicago at all, is its title ghoulish marketing for spike's aristophanes stunt--but idk how i'd address those without seeing it.)

wow d-40 even being disingenuous as repost policeman, a new low

― mattresslessness, Saturday, 12 December 2015 04:17 (1 hour ago) Permalink

this is a great archetypal mattresslessness post in its pseud condescension

apologies for not realizing he hadn't linked to the review but to a second review, it was very "disingenuous" (tf??) of me to make that error

--because i watch moved liberals weep at handsomely mounted injustice almost every weekend, and imo i might as well be projecting porn. (gonna nag the office to get this-- we got dear white people, which the moved liberals did not like, so there's a chance.) no idea if this movie's good or not but i think aggressive, passionate satire is a better way to keep people awake at night than respectful realism--and at the very least not a reason in itself to condemn a movie. (i know there are other reasons it's being condemned--is it about 2015 chicago at all, is its title ghoulish marketing for spike's aristophanes stunt--but idk how i'd address those without seeing it.)

― denies the existence of dark matter (difficult listening hour), Friday, December 11, 2015 10:32 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

is bibby a 'liberal'?

i didn't read him as talking about himself there. he says right before it that he thinks the movie should have been more of a documentary and that it won't do something the interviewer paraphrases as "wake people up". does he mean he too remains asleep?

I'm not saying I agree with everything Bibby says, but I think it's fair to say when a movie is supposed to "wake people up" that it should at least have a comprehension of the dynamics—not necessarily the same as the specifics—of that situation. (I'm going to sidebar for now the fact that I think everyone's been pretty "woke" to chicago's violence problem for the last three years)

i don't disagree w/ the general premise of your post—obviously there's no form, satire or realism, which is inherently more 'respectful' of the situation, and in some cases giving it some distance from the reality is an artistic & maybe political positive. (Although I articulated that POV on twitter & Malcom London RT'd to say more or less, as a recall, that it really just freezes a caricature in the nation's mind)

but can we at least agree there are ways in which this might not ring true—not in the accuracy of specific signs depicted, but in its ability to grapple w/ the reality—that could be perceived not only as disrespectful, but ultimately sabotaging of the art, especially since the art is specifically suggesting it will have some rubber-meets-the-road effect?

he's talking about the emotions he thinks the movie ought to induce in the audience and i'm just skeptical of the notion that tearful audiences of realistic movies about social outrages are communing any closer with victims than confused or bewildered or uncomfortably amused ones.

sry that was xp.

like, i get that the Takes are flying fast & furious and there are lots of ppl who are like "why isn't this a reverent docu-drama with strings to indicate sadness" but the criticism im reading from bibby seems to be reaching beyond that:

Chicago is not purple and orange. We don't gangbang like that. It's just like, every street—it's different blocks. And we don't meet up in different spots like that, and have meetings and shit like that. We don't have old guys in gangs. It's really just kids, smoking weed and drinking and lean, and somebody killed their cousin or their friend and they wake up everyday wanting to get their revenge. I guess that's the only way they know.

he wants to make it more fantastical. more artfully abstracted from the reality. but what if he does it in a way that erases the truth ppl experience there, or warps it for a national audience? i think that can be a legitimate grievance. it feels like ppl on the one hand want to argue "its not insensitive because this is about a real situation" and on the other hand that its art so that it might have harmful consequences can be waved away under creative license (XXP)

dude, you have to see this movie and report back. it's the only way out of this mess we are in in this country. and people keep picking on you here. we need a long-ass review with some pert info.

but can we at least agree there are ways in which this might not ring true—not in the accuracy of specific signs depicted, but in its ability to grapple w/ the reality—that could be perceived not only as disrespectful, but ultimately sabotaging of the art

sure-- the movie could have nothing to say, could be fatuous, narcissistic, not revelatory of anything. lots of movies are like that. but "a sex strike wouldn't really work", "it should be more realistic", "it should make you cry" are not arguments about that. in fact he talks plenty about the details and feelings it does get right-- enough to make me want to see it more even if i come away as disappointed as him.

the old guys thing is a sharp criticism, fair.

this is a pretty good thread

--because i watch moved liberals weep at handsomely mounted injustice almost every weekend, and imo i might as well be projecting porn. (gonna nag the office to get this--

dlh what do you do

i work at a single-screen movie theater that also does a lot of live stuff; i run the projector and cook the food and do the buying and fill in gaps on shows' tech crews. (i am also an editor at a large music streaming service.) it's oscarbait season and i have seen a lot of true stories lately.

posting on the way home from teching the nutcracker, speaking of the season.

(my mean remarks about liberals are because many of our regulars are senior citizens from the town up the road, puna; a local synonym for "hippie" is "punatic". actually these people are lovely i just get bitchy about their politics sometimes because they look disapproving when i read them the popping oil ingredients.)

Spike Lee at his most brechtian since maybe School Daze doesn't warrant criticisms about truth and accuracy. Whatever the merits of the movie, the point of making it stylized and unreal and dissonant is to give the politics of the movie some space to breath. The unreality is the prod that sets the audience thinking instead of simply being engaged with a story.

Deej, do you think Spike Lee is any less respectful of the experiences of Chicagoans than Mozzy is to the experiences of Sacramentans? Do Mozzy's tapes reflect Sacramentans' experiences? Or do his tapes "erase the truth ppl experience there, or warp it for a national audience"? E.g. when you contrast Mozzy's numerous explicit references to committing murder with the actual murder rate of Sacramento, which nearly matches the not especially "gut-wrenching" or "shocking" but very realistic rate of the rest of California, you might think either that Mozzy committed all 27 murders (out of 480,000 people) in Sacramento last year or that, possibly a shoe store slap fight here or there notwithstanding, Mozzy is just another Gene Simmons selling a rock n roll fantasy; and that's fine with me, but there's no internal consistency in your criticism of one artist and your plaudits for another, though I look forward to your tortuous explanations as to why I'm so wrong.

You're also still pushing this narrative that Chicago violence has entered the national consciousness post-drill, which I think is very self-serving considering your role in promoting the music. I don't know what rhetorical effort you've put into convincing everyone this is true except to say that there are people out there in the world who have talked about Chicago violence since drill came into being, which duh. People talked about it before drill, too.

man, dlh, your job sounds sweet

-

bmc: does this movie actually literally repeat the 'wake up' ending from 'school daze'? or was i misinformed?

the color-coded spartans/trojans stuff sounds very baz luhrmann and obviously is not how it Is but movies can and will do many things. a lot of the critical articles i've read (by people who've seen it and not) seem to think that there's some other, realistic, respectful movie someone could make that really would "wake people up" and cause Change. maybe there is. someone should make it. but in my experience sober, polished tragedy reduces to entertainment just as easily as insane satire--easier, actually, because i think a lot of people feel like subjecting themselves to dramatic tragedy is a kind of moral act, and nothing is more entertaining than performing moral acts. like i thought this line in the lil bibby piece (which contains a lot of praise!) was wrong--

It's supposed to make you want to cry. A lot of the stuff that they were doing was funny. Even the whole rhyme scheme, that shit was just stupid. If you see some shit on Chicago, people need to want to cry at the end, not laugh, because it really is sad.

--because i watch moved liberals weep at handsomely mounted injustice almost every weekend, and imo i might as well be projecting porn. (gonna nag the office to get this-- we got dear white people, which the moved liberals did not like, so there's a chance.) no idea if this movie's good or not but i think aggressive, passionate satire is a better way to keep people awake at night than respectful realism--and at the very least not a reason in itself to condemn a movie. (i know there are other reasons it's being condemned--is it about 2015 chicago at all, is its title ghoulish marketing for spike's aristophanes stunt--but idk how i'd address those without seeing it.)
― denies the existence of dark matter (difficult listening hour), Friday, December 11, 2015 10:32 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

just wanted to cheer this post. a lot of the criticisms of the film simply seem to be upset that lee’s treatment of the violence in chicago doesn’t fulfill their ideas of "realism"—that it isn’t sober enough. it’s quite possible that the film is a disaster, but naturally lee has every right—and probably a duty, given his body of work—to treat the subject in as outlandish and stylized a fashion as he would like.

this isn’t playing here and i don’t know if it’ll open in this town. but i hope to see this.

I haven't seen the movie yet (has there been a friend lately in which so many people post this disclaimer?), but dlh's comments remind me of the reaction to JFK from libs who thought Stone "muddied the waters" (I think it was beloved Richard Cohen; I'm not looking it up) and tut-tutted him for not being courageous enough to make An Honest Film about What Really Happened. The honest straightforward take w/out any of the movie's awesome lurid, ridiculous, "how's your mousse" moments wouldn't have done anything except reassure those convinced the Warren Commission was fiction. At least Stone's approach questions almost every piety of the left and right -- almost every piety, for DO NOT FORGET YOUR DYING KING.

i was tempted to see it this weekend but tbh i like chris hemsworth and i love patrick o'brian looking shit so i'm probably gonna see the whaler pic instead

I read that Ron Howard's take on the guy's fictionalized take on the true events that inspired Melville's "Moby Dick" does not do the reality justice, and that the rampant use of CGI does not pay proper respect to the real violence of mother nature and vindictive whales.

man that reminds me i'm in this kinda book club thing and we're reading ecology papers for fun (which reminds me i was looking up papers on assemblage theory and came across a paper by a sometime ilxor, only it was on like renaissance english lit instead of like hubbell's unified neutral theory so it was pretty funny) and there was this one awesome paper involving predation, i can't find it for free anywhere but this facebook post has the abstract - https://www.facebook.com/OrcaProjectSriLanka/posts/971991626199133 - if you've got a login for access to academic papers i highly recommend it, fun stuff, but man talk about violence.