Do the Right Thing written and directed by Spike Lee is a story that is timeless. In New York City, an Italian man named Sal owns a pizza shop in a predominantly black neighborhood. His shop has a “wall of fame”. On that wall, there are only white people. Buggin Out, a friend of arguably the main character, Mookie, comes into the shop and questions why there are no people of color on that wall. As the film moves along, the story unfolds and racial tensions run high.
When discussing Audience Receptive Theory, there are two categories we focus on. The first being Cultural Identity and the second is Interpretive Community. Cultural Identity is the focus on how age, ethnicity, and education immediately allows us to have a certain reception of a film. Interpretive Community is the way a film is perceived by a specific culture.
With Do the Right Thing, I really did not know what to expect with this film. I knew that it dealt with themes such as police brutality and racial injustice, however I could not have guessed how important and special this film truly is even 31 years later.
The world we live in now feels like a simulation. From the world literally burning, to the beginnings of practically a second Civil War, nothing feels real. Yet, it is. Watching this film felt like I was watching something from the news that was aired last week. It felt like I was in the movie, living that same thing because everything that happened in the film, still occurs today.
As a white woman in society, I cannot begin to understand the struggles and pain black people go through every single day. I am not naive to the privilege I have as a white person in America. This film solidified that. I can simply sit outside and not have police officers whisper, “what a waste” as they drive by me. I do not have to worry about being harassed because of the color of my skin.
Something that specifically stood out to me was Radio Raheem. In general, his character was so much more than just a man with a stereo. His character stood for love, and justice. The music that came from the stereo was always the same song. The song is “Fight the Power” by Public Enemy. The song is used in the opening sequence, as well. That opening sequence held a lot of subtext along with Radio Raheem’s character. In the opening scene, you see a woman dancing in different costumes. I kind of saw that as it was foreshadowing the movie. She was struggling with the way she was dancing. I am not meaning she was struggling to dance, more so she was dancing in a way that simulated a struggle. The woman dancing ended up being Mookie’s girlfriend. She was on the outside of the main issues of the movie, but she was still there. From the opening sequence, it is just so clear to me that that was her purpose. It was to foreshadow.
Going back to Radio Raheem and this song, the reason he carried that stereo around was not to annoy people. It was to send a message. Some of the lyrics of the song are; “Our freedom of speech is freedom or death, we got to fight the powers that be”, “To revolutionize make a change nothing’s strange, People, people we are the same, No we’re not the same”, Most of my heroes don’t appear on no stamps, Sample a look back you look and find, Nothing but rednecks for four hundred years if you check”. These lyrics are extremely powerful and mean so much to the world of the film. Specifically one that sticks out to me is the line about freedom of speech is freedom or death. That is what happened to Radio Raheem. When Buggin Out and Radio Raheem went to Sal’s to protest about the colorless wall of fame, he spoke his mind. He had his “freedom”, yet was first attacked for having his stereo loud in the shop, then killed mercilessly by a police officer because of the color of his skin. The song foretold this entire movie. The music overall was a huge aspect that helped in carrying out the story. It was not just this song, but more music as well such as “Can’t Stand It” by Steel Pulse. To the ear, it sounds very up-tempo and upbeat. However the closer you listen to the lyrics, it is about not being able to stand the climate of society rather than the actual temperate climate.
Another key aspect of this movie that stayed with me after watching it was the racism from all minority groups. I think a lot of times, as a white person, it’s easier to think that racism only comes from white people. As we can see in this film, that is far from the case. For example, when they did these melodramatic close-up shots of each group saying different slurs and stereotypes about other groups it was easy to see that racism comes from all angles. The moment toward the end of the film after the shop was burning down, the group of black people in front of the shop turned around to look at the Korean shop and were about to attack that shop too. The one black man who was in front said something along the lines or, “we’re the same, but we are not the same”, directing it to the Korean family that owned the store. That stuck with me. That statement is so true. We all are the same, regardless of our skin color. Yet, black lives are not valued still even today. I really liked that point that was made. It put things into perspective for everyone.
The timeless nature of this film will never cease to amaze me. That is what I took away most from the film. You could play this film 20 years from now and more than likely it may still be relevant. That is really sad and unfortunate to think about, but it is reality. If we as audience members, as humans, do not act this will continue to be the reality for so many people. I really liked how the radio station, “WE LOVE”, said at the very end to vote. I lost my mind at the comment, not because I did not agree. I reacted that way because it is election season and that is what everyone is talking about right now. It felt so real for me, and I am not black. I cannot imagine how real the film felt for someone who is black.
If there is one thing I think we can all take away from this film, it is that we need to show love today, tomorrow and everyday after that. Showing kindness and spreading love is a step in the right direction to work on changing the course of history we continue to create. Let this be your wake up call, if you have chosen to stay asleep. Let this be an example. We need to change, and we need to do it now. And as Mister Senor Love Daddy said, register to vote and vote for honesty and compassion this November. And, always remember to do the right thing.
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