BlacKkKlansman (2018)
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BlacKkKlansman Movie Review
BlacKkKlansman is a 2018 historical biopic directed by Spike Lee and starring John David Washington and Adam Driver. It’s an unexpectedly engaging movie.
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“With the right white man, we can do anything“
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It follows a true story of a black police officer and a Jewish one who infiltrate and expose the local Ku Klux Klan. It’s such a wild, crazy to believe story that actually happened in real life so that realization made the film even more effective for me, though they obviously took some liberties with it.
I absolutely loved the first half of the movie. It was so entertaining and even suspenseful. But the second half was never as involving, it became quite silly in a couple of sequences and the ending really disappointed me as it was anti-climactic plus the footage of today’s protests and Trump really made the film sound foolish when it’s comparing the seventies with today’s time. I really disliked that comparison.
But the first half is, as I said, so good that I really liked this film nonetheless. I enjoyed the suspense in it and especially the conversations on the phone and the interrogations inside the KKK were all so thrilling and entertaining. I also found the seventies well realized here.
John David Washington is serviceable in the main role, but never all too good and this is the obvious case of nepotism at play as his father is Denzel Washington. But Topher Grace was well cast as the main villain and I really liked the performances of all the KKK members. The highlight was obviously Adam Driver who gave such a strong performance in basically a dual role that required him to act as a man who acts. He thus proved once again how talented he is.
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BlacKkKlansman is interestingly titled which makes for an intriguing look whenever you see its name. The direction from Spike Lee is reliably strong, but the movie has nothing new to say about racism and it’s overly familiar in that regard. It’s pretty well edited and paced and also very well shot and scored. It’s quite engaging and suspenseful, but just not as sophisticated as it thinks it is.
BlacKkKlansman is a surprisingly engaging and suspenseful movie that is especially potent in its first half which is very entertaining and so well executed across the board. The movie has nothing new to say about racism, the second half has its silly scenes and the ending is problematic, but Adam Driver is terrific in a very interesting role, its real-life story is fascinating and the film is at its best in its very involving conversation, interrogation and infiltration sequences.
