BlacKkKlansman

When I was in my early twenties, I discovered the magnificently hilarious Western spoof Mel Brooks’ Blazing Saddles. That’s about the right age to watch a film like that for the first time because you are at the age where you can understand the point of that film and not come away from it thinking Mel Brooks is a racist, ignorant fool. Mel Brooks is anything but that, and the whole point of his movie is to point out the stupidity of racism and how ignorant and moronic having that mindset actually is. He also set out to make one of the funniest comedies of all time. At least some of the time, I felt the same message was on display in BlacKkKlansman, a docudrama directed by Spike Lee. The biggest difference, though, is tone. There are scenes in BlacKkKlansman that are just as funny as Blazing Saddles, especially when dealing with David Duke and the KKK, but there are also moments that are very dark and disturbing, especially in the epilogue Spike Lee attacked to the ending. 

I have written on the subject of racism a number of times on this blog, most recently with my review of In the Heat of the Night, and it will always be a tough subject for me. My reasons are twofold: I’m a white male, and no matter how much I emphasize with minorities and their struggles, I have not personally had to deal with it and thus cannot 100% comprehend that struggle; and I don’t live in a part of the country where this struggle is even seen often enough to comprehend that level of hatred towards another individual simply because of their race. I’ve been around long enough to have seen racism in action— especially during my years living in the Deep South— but that doesn’t make me an expert on race relations. I can only rely on my life experiences, my upbringing, and what I see in the media, the movies, and in literature. All I can do in my personal life is live by example and support minorities whenever I can. For some, that may not be enough, but it’s what I have to offer this world. 

When I look at movies like this, I have to take them on the level they are playing at. In this case, it is a social commentary based on a true story that is also taking aim at our current state of the world. The incident in Charlottesville seen in the epilogue is clearly hitting home that this story is not just a relic of the past but is very much topical. When the film was conceived and written, it was prior to the 2016 election and the Donald Trump presidency. Since then, racial tension and xenophobia have only gotten worse. As I write this, it is at an all-time high again with people being detained, deported, and otherwise harassed, whether they have a legal right to be in this country or not. Racism and hatred are boiling over all over again, and marches in the streets like the one in Charlottesville are becoming a commonplace thing, again. I wouldn’t be surprised if we see another Martin Luther King, Jr appear representing the minorities in these troubling times, and I also wouldn’t be surprised if that person was assassinated. It’s a hard time to be alive. Maybe not as hard as the 60s and 70s were for the minorities, but it’s pretty darn close. 

A Black man and a Jewish man infiltrate the Klan; it seems like the start of a joke, yet it really did happened. In 1972, Ron Stallworth (John David Washington) is hired as the first Black officer in the Colorado Springs Police Department. As he is being brought in, his commander treats it like he is Jackie Robinson, letting him know that there may be others in the department that will hate him and call him all sorts of racist slurs and that he, like Robinson, will need to have the temperament to ignore it. Then he assigns Ron to the records office, working side-by-side with a hostile officer who is the very definition of racist. 

Ron makes it clear early on that he has ambitions to be an undercover detective, but these aspirations are dismissed at first. Then one day he is called into his commanding officer’s office and told he will, in fact, be going undercover, attending a local rally where national civil rights leader Kwame Ture (a.k.a. Stokely Carmichael) (Corey Hawkins) is speaking. His job is to attend the rally and gauge the crowd, looking for signs of violent activity. While there, he meets Patrice Dumas (Laura Harrier), president of the Black Student Union at Colorado College. Patrice, like most of the people at the rally, has a distrust of the police, especially after being stopped while driving Ture to his apartment. During that stop, the officer who pulls them over sexually assaults her, frisking her for alleged weapons. Ron lies to her about being a cop and the two start going out together. 

One day, Ron sees an advert for the Ku Klux Klan in the newspaper. He calls the number and, posing as a white man, arranges for a meeting with what they clandestinely refer to themselves as, The Organization. During the call, he accidentally gives them his real name. Knowing he cannot show up to the meeting as himself, he arranges for fellow detective Flip Zimmerman (Adam Driver) to go to the meeting instead, posing as Ron Stallworth. Together, the two infiltrate the KKK, gain the trust of the ignorant racist men in the group, and use their inside information to prevent the group from committing any of their planned hate crimes. Meanwhile, the real Ron manages to get in contact with David Duke (Topher Grace), Grand Wizard of the KKK, and leads the leader on, using that contact to further the police’s agenda to prevent violent crimes from occurring. But the KKK are determined and have plans to plant a bomb at an upcoming Black rally.

This movie is based on the memoirs of Ron Stallworth, depicting his experiences infiltrating the Klan.  Screenwriters Charlie Wachtel and David Rabinowitz co-wrote the original script after having read the book and finding it extremely relevant to today’s world. In doing so, some liberties were taken to condense history for dramatic effect. This is primarily noticeable in the interactions between David Duke and Ron Stallworth. David Duke was not a Grand Wizard of the KKK at the time and wouldn’t be for another six years. He also never found out about being tricked by Ron until well into the 2000s. Historical inaccuracies aside, much of this story is factual, and the screenplay was overlooked at every stage by the real Ron Stallworth. 

It takes a steady hand with a good eye for drama and comedy to make a film like this and not have it feel like the tones are clashing with each other. This movie has some sharp contrasts from comedic moments to tense dramatic ones, yet those two things are never at odds with each other. We have a slightly surreal moment where Felix Kendrickson (Jasper Pääkkönen) is introducing Flip to his American-as-Apple-Pie wife, Connie (Ashlie Atkinson), who treats the Klan meetings as no more than just a bunch of guys hanging out. Her casual use of the N-word seems so out of place coming from her yet she delivers these lines perfectly. From there, in less than a minute, Flip is in the basement staring down the barrel of a gun and being forced to take a polygraph test to prove his Aryan heritage. As intense as this moment is, Spike Lee throws in the absurd request for Flip to drop his pants to prove he isn’t Jewish. It’s absurd, funny, and scary all at the same time. Spike Lee does this a lot throughout the picture. Even more absurd are the interactions between Ron and David Duke as Ron spouts off long bits of dialogue using every racist slang in the book while Duke just eats it all up, thinking he has found a kindred spirit. 

While BlackKklansman is humorous in a way that only Spike Lee can pull off, it doesn’t mask the undertones of the seriousness that racism is. Kwame Ture is preaching to his people to prepare for a war. The KKK, while being presented as ignorant morons, have violent plans of their own, plans designed to kill. There are also plenty of bits of casual racism on display, including how Ron is initially treated when he first takes his job at the police station. It’s therefore refreshing when he gets reassigned to the detective division, and his two teammates don’t treat him differently. Flip can relate to a degree because Jews face similar discrimination. You get a real sense of the conflict in his character as he has to play a racist, hiding that he is supposedly championing against his own people. The third member of the team doesn’t get as much attention or a background and is mainly an unnecessary character.

BlackKklansman isn’t going to be for everyone. The topic of racism and violence will be too much for some. The absurdity on display may also turn some people away. Just watching an auditorium of Klan members laughing and cheering on a viewing of D.W. Griffith’s Birth of a Nation will be a bit much for anyone who doesn’t catch on to what Spike Lee is doing with this film. We are meant to look at these people as rubes, rednecks, and morons. Casting Topher Grace as the face of the ignorant is a brilliant move, too. For many, he is the likable goofball from That ‘70s Show and brings a certain level of likability with that persona. That juxtaposes oddly with his hatful rhetoric in a way that is absolutely hilarious. 

This film opens with Alec Baldwin in front of a projector trying to sell a narrow-minded view of the races. It sets the tone for this movie brilliantly, giving us a look at hatred and bigotry while also being tongue-in-cheek. Spike Lee knew what he was doing mixing these two seemingly clashing tones. It’s only in the epilogue where the humor is completely removed, and we see the modern-day horrors of racial division. There are images of protestors, people brawling and even a car running into the crowds. This epilogue comes dangerously close to going too far, but it is necessary to tie in the film to modern events and really hammer home that this is not something that is strictly a product of the past. We are still feeling the effects of years of division, and that’s not likely to end anytime soon. 

Academy Award Nominations:

Best Picture: Sean McKittrick, Jason Blum, Raymond Mansfield, Jordan Peele, and Spike Lee

Best Director: Spike Lee

Best Supporting Actor: Adam Driver

Best Adapted Screenplay: Charlie Wachtel & David Rabinowitz and Kevin Willmott & Spike Lee (won)

Best Film Editing: Barry Alexander Brown

Best Original Score: Terence Blanchard

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Release Date: August 10, 2018

Running Time: 135 Minutes

Rated R

Starring: John David Washington, Adam Driver, Laura Harrier, and Topher Grace

Directed By: Spike Lee