Since its release in 1989, Spike Lee's Do the Right Thing has evaded critics' attempts to draw neat conclusions from its ending; Vincent Canby's 1989 New York Times review called it “shattering and maybe too ambiguous for its own good.” An electrifying portrayal of the way that racism, violence, and gentrification ...
“Do the Right Thing,” directed and starring Spike Lee, was released in 1989. The film is about the complexities of being black in America. In 2023 at the Toronto International Film Festival while accepting the Ebert Director Award Spike Lee recalled the press discouraging people from seeing it.
Many themes in the movie include; gentrification, racial bias, bigotry and police brutality. Sadly, a primary reason as to why Do the Right Thing remains relevant today is because many of the issues in DTRT still permeate our society today.
In articles or interviews about Do the Right Thing, the most common explanation for its enduring relevance is its depiction of police brutality, a problem that has only grown since 1989. This is true, but its lasting impact on viewers goes beyond this.
Spike Lee has criticised press reaction to Do the Right Thing on its release in 1989, saying “those motherfuckers” claimed the film would “incite black people to riot”.
Spike Lee, film director, producer and screenwriter, is renowned for a body of work that explores African American experience, challenges racial stereotypes, and addresses controversial subjects. Lee is also credited with opening up the American film industry--to an unprecedented degree--to the contributions of black ...
Controversies. After release, many reviewers protested its content. Some columnists opined that the film could incite Black audiences to riot. Lee criticized white reviewers in turn for suggesting that Black audiences were incapable of restraining themselves while watching a fictional motion picture.
What I found, is that the right thing is always the right thing to do. Making excuses for doing the wrong thing to save ourselves only hurts our integrity, self-esteem and the people around us. I am not perfect. I have not always done the right thing, but I am self-aware.
How does "Do the right thing" reflect the time it was made?
It is a visually and sonically inventive piece of cinema, which beautifully captures the heat and bubbling racial tensions of late 1980's Brooklyn. Its themes of division, anger and police brutality are as important today as they were when the film was first made.
What inspired Spike Lee to make Do the Right Thing?
In writing the film, Lee was inspired by the deaths of several Black citizens in New York City in the 1970s and '80s. One particularly notorious incident of racial violence resulted in the death of Michael Griffith, who was killed at Howard Beach in Queens in 1986.
— Martin Luther King Jr. When we know what the right thing is, we need to get on and do it — precisely because it's the right thing, not for any other reason. Doing the right thing feels hard sometimes — mainly because we've become used to justifying our actions in tenuous and selfish ways to suit our agenda.
Doing the right thing generally means making decisions that are not based on your own personal needs, that don't expand your popularity, or enforce your personal beliefs. It means doing what is best for the greater or common good. Some examples are: Maintaining your character when no one is watching.
Mookie tries to defuse the situation by taking Buggin' Out outside and telling him to wait a week before coming back. Buggin' Out attempts to start a boycott of Sal's over the "Wall of Fame," but no one will support his protest: all the people of the neighborhood have been eating at Sal's all their lives.
Do the Right Thing is a beautiful mix of comedy, great narration (what movie introduces an entire block of characters and makes you care about each of them?), intense dialogue and a very dark, grueling reality we live in, today. Not just in the United States, but everywhere in the world.
The film Do the Right Thing was written, produced, and directed by Spike Lee, who is a notable African American. The film, which was released in 1989, took place in an African-American neighborhood in Brooklyn.
What Lee had planned was not the sweeping pseudo-history of Griffith's racist epic, however. Lee's film was to be a horrific miniature of the noisy American conversation about race. A single block, in a single New York neighborhood, on a broiling summer day, is the allegorical setting for Do The Right Thing.
Quite a few of the women in the film tell their male peers what the right thing to do is in a given situation, but their lack of character development arrests almost all of their moral gravity. Viewers are urged repeatedly not to take them seriously. The movie reads differently when you place the women more centrally.
Doing the right thing often compromises our ability to get ahead or get away, at least temporarily, especially because the people we do the right things for do not appreciate our sacrifice, because they aren't good people and therefore don't behave like good people would, which is to seek to compensate you for your ...
Is doing the right thing only right if you see results?
If one does the right thing for the right reason, by definition, the outcome is right. If the result is wrong (need a definition) then maybe our inability to act perfectly is simply a failure to achieve the desired and strived for outcome. Or the outcome may have been corrupted by interference from another.
Do the right thing so it doesn't make others doubt your judgment. If others perceive you in a certain way, you want to keep in mind what others will say about you. Before carrying out the decision, try asking around if what you think of doing is truly the right thing to do. Don't ignore advice.
The racial themes of “Do the Right Thing” are, regrettably, as relevant today as they were in the late 1980s. Issues of police brutality, systemic racism, and racial tension continue to be at the forefront of societal concerns, particularly in the United States.
Do The Right Thing is ranked among the 100 greatest films in American cinematic history and for good reason. Though no direct politics are involved, important social issues such as small-scale activism and police brutality are addressed.
Spike Lee's fame can be attributed to his pioneering contributions to filmmaking, his unapologetic stance on social and political issues, and his profound impact on popular culture.
What marks Spike Lee's career as so unique and stellar, starts with him being an African American filmmaker, who with fresh vision and political/business instincts for his cohort, the mid-'80s "new black film wave", broke out of the pack with a series of "by any means necessary" financed, low-to-mid budget, independent ...
