"Malcolm X" (1992) - Movie Review

Spike Lee has his heart on “Malcolm X” and we see it in the detailed and extensive show case of the running time it takes. It is 202 minutes long and how he did not compromise that with the studio reveals his passion and the eagerness to do the film on this controversial personality. Do not let the running time of the film discourage you rather it is indeed necessary like how “Once Upon a Time in America” needed for Sergio Leone and Oliver Stone needed for “JFK”. We need to see the upside, downside, darkness, lightness and everything about a human being who was bitterly eloquent man who believed in a life style of Islam and its values, his race and its cultural significance and wanted to come for a solution. His approach most of the time aggressive, fanatic, motivational and leave us confused too.

Malcolm X (Denzel Washington) is one of the notable and influential African American leaders during the fight for the rights of the Afro American people in America. The young Malcolm with his friend Shorty (Spike Lee) enjoys his days of youth in Boston clubs in the 40s. Racism has its claws of fear in his mind but he immediately is attracted to a white female, Sophia (Kate Vernon). In very few narrations in the film, he says how much he desired for a white woman. He lives a life of drugs and crime. He hustles along with a gangster in Harlem, West Indian Archie (Delroy Lindo) and quickly falls flat in wrong terms with him to be chased for life. He gets caught with Shorty for robbery and gets imprisoned for eight to ten years. This is where his first transformation happens. Till that time, we see an angry young man as the product of the partial society but when he meets the self taught inmate Baines (Albert Hall) showing the path of Islam, he realizes that he is a waif meeting a guardian angel.

This is a strong film about a human being finding his path of life. He finds something close to his heart and sticks to it obsessively and rises up fast among the people. Lee opens the film with a speech from Malcolm and there is something wrong in it. We do not like the principles and the action he suggests to be taken. We start off not liking Malcolm X. At the end though, after one more transformation to address the actual cause, he becomes a human being who has traveled the life as any average person with more experiences than any of them. The end product of him realizing the path he took and the path he is now and the acceptance of the consequences make Malcolm X a person for discussion, inspiration and a wrong example too. The multifaceted characteristic of this influential man makes all this notable which would be normal for any other person. But he grasped a lot than them on his way to the destiny. He never hesitated to voice his opinions regardless how insensitive it is.

Not at the core of the revolutionary time period when the racial discrimination was at high, judging him might be misspoken in many ways. Lee wants us to and answers in the eulogy by Ossie Davis. I see this film not as a statement of the beliefs or the views of Lee or Malcolm X but a study of a person whose life has surprises regardless of the surroundings. Living the life as you are and setting expectations to you and others become a process of strong practice. The conflict though is that the belief turning into a fanaticism, an ego and the zest on thrusting the solution as the only solution pokes others too. The medium of handling it is aggression is what Malcolm preached. The dilemma of deriving the justice of right and wrong from an act of defense or a means to attain the position of being secure is a flimsy. Malcolm believed his position was strongly in the arena of righteousness in attaining the owning up of a secure land of freedom. Despite this, he never noticeably started or participated in a violent act. He demanded a land for his community with complete administration of philosophy that the Blacks and Whites can never live harmoniously. Such is the extremity that the principles he took on from his mentor Elijah Muhammad whom he worshipped naming Whites as devils. His eyes get opened by his wife, Betty (Angel Bassett). His conviction in that belief is enormous that betrayal and truth of darkness involved in it were impossible for him to accept.

Spike Lee has the hold on his material as he had in other movies “Do the Right Thing” and “Clockers”. He does not slip and his honesty in focusing on the rights and wrongs about Malcolm X is a tough trait to follow when the studio and the representation of him for his heritage shoulders extreme pressure. He is as many others are truly impressed by this man. I may not agree with the tactics and methods of Malcolm X but Spike Lee’s film make me like this personality as a regular person whom many might not have a chance to see. And with one of the greatest performance of his lifetime by Denzel Washignton, this is a classic film by Spike Lee.