#MovieSeriesLincoln
This 1989 film written, directed, produced, and starring Spike Lee begins as a slice-of-life picture showing the interesting characters on a changing Bed-Stuy street corner before long-simmering racial tensions finally boil over on this hottest day of the summer. The tension building begins when the local Italian pizzeria owner is questioned why his shop’s Wall of Fame only features Italian-Americans but no African-American celebrities to reflect their predominately Black neighborhood. This leads to discussions of race, then debates, then arguments, and finally violence. Through it all, Lee’s film does not try to tell the audience what to think about the events that transpire – it only demands you to think for yourself and to realize that the deep complexity of all people can mean those who we admire sometimes doing bad things and those who we detest sometimes doing good. Nominated for two Academy Awards and a Palme d’Or nominee at the 1989 Cannes Film Festival, Lee’s film features debuts and breakout performances for such mainstays as Rosie Perez, John Turturro, Samuel L. Jackson, Martin Lawrence, and Bill Nunn. The film holds the distinction of being one of six films to be selected for preservation into the Library of Congress’s National Film Registry in their first year of eligibility when it was chosen in 1999.
