I had never seen this one before, so I had NO idea that this is where the phrase “ice ice baby” came from. Vanilla Ice just stole that entire song, huh?
Anyway, this movie is kind of a mess with almost no story, but it’s still a lot of fun and a very important part of Spike’s filmography. She’s Gotta Have It was a romantic comedy without much of an agenda beyond showing black relationships to a wide audience.
School Daze, though, is built around showing the prejudices within the black community. Dark skin/light skin. College educated/not college educated. Natural hair/straightened hair.
So much dividing them when they should be coming together to fight for their cause.
It’s time to WAKE UP!
Oh, and it’s a musical. So, there’s that.
Can we also talk about what a horrible human being Giancarlo Esposito’s character is?
All Spike Lee characters are complex and can’t be called fully good or bad, but this guy is just so awful and full of hate.
Extras are plentiful featuring two commentary tracks, Anniversary cast and crew Q & A, interviews, featurettes and music videos.
Outside of the musical numbers, this feels like a dry run for what was next: Do The Right Thing, which is still one of the greatest wake up calls ever made.
This is also the beginning of a long and beautiful collaboration between Spike and Ossie Davis, so it definitely earns points for that.
