BlacKkKlansman: Spike Lee Pulls Back the Hood of Racism

Sometimes, truth is stranger than fiction. BlacKkKlansman, the latest joint from legendary director Spike Lee, is, in the movie’s own words, “based on some fo’ real, fo’ real shit.” Based on the title and trailers, you’d be forgiven for thinking this was an extension of that famous Chapelle’s Show sketch, or a Sacha Baron Cohen prank that never came to fruition. But in 1979, a black police detective did successfully infiltrate a local chapter of the Ku Klux Klan under the guise of a white man looking to join their ranks and even managed to dupe the Grand Wizard himself. Aside from a few aesthetic cues, Lee doesn’t leave any time stamps to tell what era this is. This is done on purpose, as the mission of this film is to use the grip of hate groups on the American psyche in the past with the grip they have on it now. And if opening with professional Donald Trump impersonator Alec Baldwin as a raving eugenicist doesn’t drive it home, the closing scenes where he recontextualizes the whole movie with footage of the Charlottesville riots (or the fact that he released it on the weekend of its anniversary) will.

Our story follows Ron Stallworth (John David Washington), the first black police officer in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Although the city encouraged minorities to apply, he’s still given a hard time by his superiors, getting shafted with small jobs, putting up with racist coworkers who abuse their power, and when asked to go on a covert mission, is tasked with attending a Black Panther rally. On a whim, he finds the number of a KKK recruitment line in the newspaper and impersonates a white man to get some dirt. He convinces his coworker Flip Zimmerman (Adam Driver) to attend in his place, eventually getting the attention of then Grand Wizard David Duke (Topher Grace).

Spike Lee approaches every movie like it’s going to be his last and he needs to get whatever’s on his mind on celluloid in the most spectacular fashion. Sometimes this leads to masterpieces like Do The Right Thing, 25^th Hour or Chi-Raq, other times it results in unique failures like She Hate Me or that Oldboy remake. BlacKkKlansman definitely belongs in the upper tier of the Lee oeuvre, mainly by being the most accessible movie he’s made in a while. (As much as I loved Chi-Raq, it’s not what I’d use to pop someone’s Spike Lee cherry.) Although the situation is anything but funny, Lee manages to wring a ton of humor from the situation, mainly by virtue of it being an absurd story about a crazy thing that happened but most people don’t know about, or even the uncomfortable shock of hearing some repugnantly hateful things coming from the mouth a seemingly sweet or well-spoken person. It’s a bit unconventional, but Lee never does anything conventionally.

Keeping with the timeframe, the movie is shot like a tribute to the Blaxploitation films of the 70’s right down to our protagonist and his black student union leader love interest (Laura Harrier) debating the merits of Shaft vs Superfly and Pam Greer vs Tamara Dobson. Lee also puts the classics under the knife, bringing up Hattie McDaniel’s complicated feelings of playing mammy roles, or a particularly harrowing scene where we learn the graphic details of the gruesome execution of a black teenager that directly inspired The Birth of A Nation . While the influences are clear and present, Lee still smothers the film in his, well, Lee-ness, complete with a heightened, idiosyncratic tone, dutch angles, double dolly shots, and a message delivered with all the subtlety of a T-shirt cannon to the face. Of course, some of his trademarks can be a source of frustration, and here it’s no different. The side-plot about the love interest isn’t nearly as engaging as it could be, the lack of a conventional story structure makes it a bit unwieldy at times, the attempt to impose one halfway through feels a little clunky, and the lack of a cohesive ending in lieu of an admittedly effective call to action will have some leaving the theater angry for all the wrong reasons.

While the movie forces its audience to confront its racist past and reconcile it with its racist present, the characters are more or less forced to do the same. Driver’s character in particular mostly treated his Jewish heritage as an afterthought for most of his life until he meets up with the Klan and his confronted with anti-Semitism personally for the first time. Likewise, but to a lesser extent, Stallworth is confronted about the contradiction of his alliance with the revolutionaries and his chosen profession as a police officer. But while that internal conflict provides the dramatic backbone, it helps that the villains they’re fighting are an unambiguous evil. The Klan chapter they infiltrated are the archetype of what you think of when you think of a typical bigot, but it’s the head honcho David Duke who’s the most unnerving. Polite, well-spoken, charismatic, and promoting vile hatred with a smile, it’s eerily reminiscent of some of the fascist leaders of today, and leaves no room for interpretation as to where they got it from. A lot of this has to do with Topher Grace’s brilliant performance. After seeing this, you will never be able to watch That 70’s Show the same way again.

Bottom line, BlacKkKlansman is a funny, brisk, eye opening shock to the system and easily a late-career win for one of the most uneven filmmakers working today. While not everything about it works at full capacity, when it sings, it sings. It’s a bit all over the place at times, but sometimes the backroads are the best way of getting there. And in a year where we’ve had plenty of vital and exhilarating black films like Black Panther and Sorry to Bother You, this is a welcome addition to that lineup.

8/10