Reviews

Da 5 Bloods


Acting
Writing
Directing
Entertainment
Final Thoughts

Spike Lee's latest joint feels disjointed and full of plot holes, but at least DA 5 BLOOD gives us Delroy Lindo in his Oscar-worthy performance.

Overall Score 2.6
Readers Rating
1 votes
0.9

“DA 5 BLOODS” is a Spike Lee joint alright. There’s racial message, racial stereotyping, racial injustice and racial justice enough for three movies, but who am I to judge that aspect of the film? What I will tho, is judge the film itself.

Good things first – Delroy Lindo finally gets to step out from playing supporting hard-ass generals, hard-ass detectives and hard-ass mob bosses to finally shine as a lead man. It is a shame that this actor could have been no less famous than Samuel L. Jackson or Denzel Washington had he been given a proper role earlier in his career. His Oscar-worthy performance was truly captivating and it’s what kept me watching this film.

Apart from Lindo, I really enjoyed Chadwick Boseman’s performance. Weird, because he spends a total of less than five minutes on screen, he managed to deliver every aspect that his character was described to have and then some. 

Spike Lee, though, dropped the ball. I was extremely confused not only with pacing, but the overall direction of DA 5 BLOODS. It starts as a buddy road trip into memory lane, then gets infused with nostalgia and family matters, then jumps into mindless action and ends with a cliche finale. It’s like Lee took someone’s screenplay and rewrote it to fit his vision. Wait a sec, Wiki says that’s exactly what he did. So, instead of having his usual structured film (e.g. BLACKKKLANSMAN) we get a mix of 3 other films.

And then we have plot twists that you can see from a mile off. Cliche dialogues and illogical decisions. Plot conveniences and plot holes. Overused aspect ratio changes. Old actors playing younger versions of themselves. Oversimplification of politics and war. And all this drags for 2.5 hours. At least music is nice, gotta give it to Lee for keeping that consistent.

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