we have little to hang onto once the film falls apart. Between the ongoing sermonizing and that final, sharp shock - which is gravely mishandled - we feel cowed into submission, rather than led towards enlightenment
never matches the smoldering hothouse atmosphere of Lee's Summer of Sam, but its narrative shagginess and raging emotions nonetheless drum up franticness and fear. It's a forceful film whose ungainliness can be vexing
it's another steamy hot Brooklyn summer, but unlike "Do the Right Thing" two decades back, Spike Lee's sermonizing new film is too chaotic to tap into that sizzle
isn't a smooth slow jam - the awkwardness of the younger performers can be as confounding as it can be charming, and there's frequently a sense of the film flaunting its rawness self-consciously
by Elizabeth Weitzman [New York Daily News ]
by Glenn Kenny [MSN Movies ]
