Melvin Backman-Do the Right Thing

There is little, if anything, subtle about this film. Radio Raheem's boombox blares. Statements on issues of race and police brutality are heavy-handed. The colors are vibrant. The dialogue is half-screaming. I can't really relate to this film about Brooklyn's Bed-Stuy neighborhood in the 1980s, since I was born and raise in Charleston in the 1990s. I know nothing of the struggles of the protagonist, a part-time pizza deliverer/full-time hustler named Mookie since I'm a full-time student named Melvin. Something about this movie, however, pulls me in. Spike Lee's (in my opinion) masterpiece is full of energy and messages that bombard you, anger you, then force you to ask hard questions about race and the nature of resistance.