Respond to the following questions in the comments section below:

In "Spike Lee at the Movies" Amiri Baraka writes of Do the Right Thing:

"The killing of Rahim, attributed to the loud radio, trivialized the Black Liberation Movement in the same way that the bugged out movement for Black photos in the pizza parlor does...Spike's repeated response is that he has no answers to state, that art was, by his definition, vague, general and noncommittal yet could utilize the saleable aspects of Black consciousness as an umbilical cord of social 'relevance'."

From your viewing of the film, do you agree with Baraka's critique of Lee's "art"? Does Wahneema Lubiano's discussion of realism and essentialism (Section III) complicate and/or expand upon Baraka's reception of the film?


Read Gabriel Thompson's article "The United Nations of Brooklyn" (The New York Times, October 21, 2007)

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/21/nyregion/thecity/21bens.html

In what ways does the multi-ethnic make-up of Bensonhurst, Brooklyn described by Thompson differ from the society envisioned in Lee's 1989 film? How is it similar? In this new context, is Lee's work still salient?

Respond to the two questions in the comments section below:

In "Class and American Boxing Films" Aaron Baker writes:

"Jake LaMotta's social dysfunction arises from his confusion about his racial, class and sexual identities."

From your viewing of Raging Bull, provide one example (i.e. describe a scene, use of a camera/ sound/ lighting technique) that conveys the protagonist's crisis of identity.

Later Baker writes,

"Rocky and Raging Bull (1980) feature protagonists who believe passionately in their ability to single-handedly transcend social categories such as class and race. Stallone's film endorses that goal, while Scorsese's presents Jake LaMotta as achieving a kind of Christian transcendence for finally accepting its impossibility."

From your viewing and the Guglielmo and Dyer readings, does the film's protagonist fail to overcome these social categories? If so, why?

Respond to the question in the comments box below:

Of his use of the Mars Blackmon persona for his collaboration with the Nike Company to promote the Air Jordan line, Spike Lee comments:

"That's when it really blew up, that's what really got my face known -- not She's Gotta Have It." (Aftab: 52)
View the two clips:

1) Mars Blackmon/Michael Jordan (dir. S. Lee, 1986-88)



2) "Timmi Hiln*****" commercial from Bamboozled (dir. S. Lee, 2000)


From our class discussion of the "New Hollywood", the influence of European art cinema, the Black Arts movement, as well as your reading of the Biskind, Baraka, Diawara and Guerrero essays/chapters, discuss how these two clips speak to Lee's position within the multimedia landscape of the post-New Hollywood era.

Respond to the two questions in the comments section below:

What is the “New Hollywood”? Briefly discuss two economic and social factors that led to its emergence.

In “Images of Blacks in the work of Coppola, De Palma and Scorsese”, Maurizio Viano argues Scorsese represents the racism of the Italian-American community in order to achieve an “expressionist realism”, which we can define as a strategy whereby the director, by portraying the racist beliefs and prejudices of his characters may examine and “exorcise” his own. Outside of the examples provided by Viano, in what ways does a discourse on racism and prejudice emerge in Scorsese’s Mean Streets? How does Scorsese connect these issues to the conflicts within the main protagonist, Charlie (i.e. his attempt to transition from youth to adulthood)?

Respond to these two questions in the comments section below:

Comparing Italianamerican (1974) and Joe’s Bed-Stuy Barbershop (1983), describe one (1) technique both directors use to construct a particular cultural environment. Examples may come from setting, use of music (sound elements), type of shot, characters, genre, etc.


Referring to Donna Gabaccia and Houston Baker, Jr., explain how Spike Lee describes and positions the American south (Atlanta, GA) in relation to the urban north (Brooklyn, NYC). How is the north/south opposition inscribed upon and what impact does it have on the relationship between Zachariah and Ruth?

This course will examine the representation of racial and ethnic identity in film via the work of Martin Scorsese and Spike Lee. We will approach this topic first by briefly looking at the historical emergence of the Italian-American and African-American communities via immigration and U.S. migration during the early twentieth century. We’ll examine the representations of Italian- and African-Americans in the U.S. cinema, and how visual and narrative conventions have been used to construct and reinforce ethnic stereotypes of these two groups. The course will then focus on two historical events from which the work of these two directors emerge; first, the establishment of film studies as an academic discipline and second, the civil rights and countercultural movements of the 1960s and the subsequent rise of identity politics. These two events result in a new self-reflexivity on the part of filmmakers working after the 1960s in terms of their knowledge of film history and aesthetics, the use of film to interrogate ethnic identity, and to narrate specific cultural milieus. Martin Scorsese and Spike Lee have often narrated the racial dynamics between the African- and Italian American communities in New York City, often depicting their relation within the urban landscape in terms of prejudice, xenophobia and the difficulties engendered from assimilation into American society. By examining the work of these two filmmakers, we will investigate the construction and influence of ethnic stereotypes, and the ways in which these filmmakers employ, re-evaluate, challenge, and sometimes re-inscribe these constructs.