BEFORE: This is one of those movies, with such a large cast, that I think of as "time holes" - the name comes from the movie "Time Bandits", where the lead characters had a map of all the portals in the time/space continuum, showing where and when they would appear. Late in the film, when our heroes are on the ropes, fighting Evil in the Time of Legends, they realize that the villain's castle contains one of the biggest time holes of all, leading anywhere - everywhere! (Which leads to the question, why didn't the villain use it to take over the world? Ah, but he didn't have the map, maybe he didn't know about it!) This film is like that big time hole, from here I can probably go anywhere - but I just need it to get me to my Mother's Day film, as Michael Imperioli carries over from "One Night in Miami..."
This film is also over three hours long, close to three and a half. So saving it for a Friday night/Saturday morning was definitely the right move. Plus I'll also need to spend another two hours writing about it, and also figuring out where I've seen each actor or famous person last. I mean, I do have a system that uses the advanced search functions of the IMDB, but that system isn't foolproof, it falls short on archive footage, so that's why I also have to keep good notes in a separate file. The things I do to keep this blog running...
THE PLOT: Biographical epic of the controversial and influential Black Nationalist leader, from his early life and career as a small-time gangster to his ministry as a member of the Nation of Islam.
AFTER: I know, after watching "Da 5 Bloods", which I mostly enjoyed, that I promised to catch up on the Spike Lee movies that I haven't seen, despite my personal feelings against his filmmaking style. This film, though a very thorough biography of Malcolm X's life, proves my point. Who's the first character we see? Shorty, played by Spike Lee himself. The film's SUPPOSED to focus on Malcolm X, yet it starts on Shorty - Spike can't resist putting himself into his own movie, and starting on him, and THAT'S what pisses me off. It's not all about you, Spike, same goes for the Oscar that "Green Book" won - sometimes things are about people and things that are not Spike Lee! The beginning of this film (and the ending, but more about that later) kind of ruined this for me.
The in-between stuff was solid, assuming this story was accurate (and it should be, it's based on the autobiography that was co-written with acclaimed author Alex Haley. So there's a lot of information here that I didn't know, like Malcolm X's criminal past, back when he was Malcolm Little, I didn't know he lived in Roxbury, MA between the ages of 14 and 21 - that's the part of Boston my father was born in - and after some time living in Flint, Michigan, he moved to Harlem and engaged in criminal activity there, but was arrested in Boston for burglary and served time in Charlestown State Prison, then was transferred to Norfolk Prison (now called MCI-Norfolk, and that's very close to where I was born.)
Malcolm got turned on to the teachings of Islam by a fellow inmate, and kicked drugs and straightened himself out (while also un-straightening his hair) in prison. He kept up his education and stayed in contact with the Nation of Islam, and then joined the movement after his parole, moving to Chicago to work under Elijah Muhammed at the Nation of Islam's headquarters there. Gradually he became the spokesman for the organization, but when he found out that Elijah Muhammed had fathered several children out of wedlock, which was against the religion's teachings, that's when Malcolm began to question his role in the organization - ah, so THAT's the reason his character was having doubts in "One Night in Miami...", it's kind of all coming together now.
In yesterday's film, he was also planning to take a pilgrimage to Mecca, and in this film, we see him do just that, though he was supposedly watched by U.S. government agents during his travels. (I didn't quite understand why he said he was going to Mecca, then we see him visiting the Egyptian pyramids, which are in a totally different country. But Wikipedia explains that after the Mecca visit, he took a side trip to arrange a future visit to Africa for Elijah Muhammed, and this took him to the United Arab Republic, which included Egypt) Then, after meeting fellow Muslims of all different skin colors and from all walks of life, when he returned to the U.S. he left the Nation of Islam and founded the Organization of Afro-American Unity, teaching tolerance instead of racial separation. But this also led to his house being fire-bombed, an event which was also depicted at the end of "One Night in Miami..."
I did appreciate seeing Malcolm X question the prison chaplain, dispelling the myth that Jesus had white skin and blue eyes, when that just wouldn't be logical at all. But why stop there, with Jesus' race, and not continue to question whether he really rose from the dead, or turned water in to wine? If you ask me, if one part of the religious dogma is obviously B.S., then there's a great likelihood that it's ALL B.S. I guess this is where Malcolm X and I would have a difference of opinion, he chose to believe in certain parts of the Bible, the ones that fit his beliefs, and then the Koran, as well. But once my brain started unraveling the threads of the fabric, I found that it all began to fall apart for me - substituting a new religion for the one that I no longer believed in didn't seem like a viable solution to me, but I guess that worked for him.
Still, the film was very informative, and after three hours detailing nearly everything in his life, it inevitably had to cover his death, where three gunmen disrupted a speaking engagement at the Audubon ballroom in Manhattan. The film closes with archive footage of Malcolm X, but then that's followed by Spike Lee being Spike again (I guess he can't help it) sticking in footage of his famous friends and heroes, like Michael Jordan, Janet Jackson and Willie Mays, when I'm not aware of any tangible connections between them and Malcolm X, except that they're all famous African-American's. Bill Cosby's in there too, so any regrets about that, Spike? Screw you, Spike Lee, for trying to somehow make this about you and your friends and how cool you are for knowing those people.
That's going to wrap up my transposed Black History Month - just in time for Mother's Day. I realize how presumptuous it was of me to move this event, I had no right to do so. But still, I learned a lot and I think that this was better than not commemorating the event at all, which is the road I've taken in previous Movie Years. Anyway, they're always saying that Black History doesn't end when Black History Month is over, so I hope I'm in the clear. (also, February has 28 days most years, but May has 31, just saying...and Malcolm X was born in May...) I covered Ma Rainey, Bobby Seale, black soldiers in Vietnam, jazz, racially motivated voter suppression, John Lewis, Barack & Michelle Obama, the post-slavery south seen in "Beloved" and "The Color Purple", Harriet Tubman, Muhammad Ali and Malcolm X. That seems fairly thorough in retrospect, but there's probably still enough material for me to do this again next year, if the linking allows.
Also starring Denzel Washington (last seen in "The Equalizer 2"), Angela Bassett (last heard in "Soul"), Albert Hall (last seen in "Beloved"), Al Freeman Jr. (last seen in "Finian's Rainbow"), Delroy Lindo (last seen in "Da 5 Bloods"), Spike Lee (last seen in "Michael Jackson's Journey from Motown to Off the Wall"), Theresa Randle (last seen in "Bad Boys for Life"), Kate Vernon (last seen in "Pretty in Pink"), Lonette McKee (last seen in "Richard Pryor: Omit the Logic"), Tommy Hollis, James McDaniel, Ernest Lee Thomas, Jean-Claude La Marre, O.L. Duke, Larry McCoy, Maurice Sneed, Debi Mazar (last seen in "She's Funny That Way"), Phyllis Yvonne Stickney, Scot Anthony Robinson, Sonny Jim Gaines, Joe Seneca, LaTanya Richardson (last seen in "Freedomland"), Leonard L. Thomas (ditto), Wendell Pierce (last seen in "The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part 2"), Michael Guess, Leland Gantt, Giancarlo Esposito (last seen in "Okja"), Roger Guenveur Smith (last seen in "The Clapper"), Graham Brown, Gerica Cox, Shirley Stoler (last seen in "Desperately Seeking Susan"), Oran “Juice” Jones, Ricky Gordon, Veronica Webb (last seen in "Someone Like You"), Steve White, Mary Alice, Ed Herlihy, Karen Duffy (last seen in "Reality Bites"), Walter Emanuel Jones, Beatrice Winde (last seen in "It Could Happen to You"), Billy J. Mitchell (last seen in "Never Say Never Again"), Martin Donovan (last seen in "The Portrait of a Lady"), James Murtaugh (last seen in "Everybody's Fine"), Tim Kelleher (last seen in "Matchstick Men"), Michael Cullen (last seen in "The Place Beyond the Pines"), Miki Howard,
with cameos from Karen Allen (last seen in "Starman"), Peter Boyle (last seen in "The Candidate"), David Patrick Kelly (last seen in "John Wick: Chapter 2"), William Kunstler, Nelson Mandela (last seen in "Whitney"), Christopher Plummer (last seen in "Knives Out"), John Sayles, Richard Schiff (last seen in "The Gambler"), Bobby Seale (last seen in "Da 5 Bloods"), Al Sharpton (last seen in "Mr. Dynamite: The Rise of James Brown"), Nicholas Turturro (last seen in "BlacKkKlansman"), John David Washington (ditto), Craig Wasson (last seen in "Ghost Story"), Ashanti, with narration by Ossie Davis (last seen in "No Direction Home: Bob Dylan")
and archive footage of Muhammad Ali (last seen in Da 5 Bloods"), Angela Davis (ditto), Tracy Chapman, Bill Cosby, Vincent D'Onofrio (last seen in "Steal This Movie"), Janet Jackson, Jesse Jackson (last seen in "John Lewis: Good Trouble"), Martin Luther King (ditto), Malcolm X (ditto), Andrew Young (ditto), Magic Johnson (last seen in "Fyre"), Michael Jordan, John F. Kennedy (last seen in "Matinee"), Rodney King (last seen in "Straight Outta Compton"), Joe Louis, Willie Mays, Jackie Robinson, Betty Shabazz, George Wallace (last seen in "Muscle Shoals").
RATING: 6 out of 10 foster homes
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