Spike Lee
S.O.S. Summer of Sam

THE REVIEW

Based on a true story.

In New York, during the summer of 1977, in the Italian-American neighborhood, the "Son of Sam", an elusive serial killer, spreads death and terror by randomly killing people (but in reality, it's a DOG ordering him to do it!) with his .44 magnum.

The community is terrified and shaken but also determined to catch the monster and in its own way investigates.

A notable cast featuring John Leguizamo, a ladies' hairdresser more interested in women than in hairstyles, married, unfaithful, brash. Adrien Brody, the different one, the punk (it's '77, as I mentioned), an alien in the traditionalist and retrograde Italian-mafioso community, and then Mira Sorvino, Ben Gazzara and much more.

It's a complex film, perhaps excessively long (141 min.) but one that I found fascinating, original I would say. It deviates from other Spike Lee films if only because this time it's not centered around a Black community ("Black" can no longer be said, I know, but "of color" is worse, come on) like "Do the Right Thing" or "Clockers", but on an American reality (we immigrants) and on a historical period that somehow serves as a watershed between the "old" and the "new" regarding mentality, customs, music, and cinema.

The murders and the killer loom over the story but they are not exclusively the dominant reason for the film. Rather, it is around these bloody events that the film unfolds and builds, and slowly swells like a lazy tide that drags everything with it until a pyrotechnic finale.

Without resorting to the hated SPOILER S.O.S., it is remembered for several scenes of sex and violence (fuck yeah!) and watch out for the soundtrack as this time Spike has put in some magnificent tracks (from the era)... there's even BABA O' RILEY!

The film divided critics and audiences; among the negative criticisms, besides the excessive length, there is something unresolved, as if at times, it wanders aimlessly or drags on.

I've seen it three times and I didn't have this sensation; the film captivated me, I believed in it. For me, it's a great film, perhaps my favorite of Spike Lee's.