Jungle Fever, the feature film by Spike Lee directly preceding his well-respected biopic Malcolm X, is a whopping statement against drugs and white supremacy. To reference an earlier Lee "joint's" title, it explores the respective dazes of two African-American brothers - Flipper Purify (Wesley Snipes), who's mesmerized by a white woman's lure, and Gator Purify (Samuel L. Jackson), a crack addict. Lee's thorough investigation of the drugs and race issues is undercut by his inability to write a truly satisfying narrative featuring Flipper and Gator's plot lines.
To return to the film's central issue of delusion, its most problematic viewpoint is that of extensive judgment of architect Flipper's affair with his Italian-American secretary, Angie (Annabella Sciorra). Lee's title, Jungle Fever, slyly refers to a psychological haze experienced by some people in interracial relationships. The rub comes in Lee's obvious statement on what Flipper - and perhaps all black men who are involved with white women - want, in the character's name: "Flipper Purify." Could a more ham-fisted summary be presented in film? In addition, Snipes' character is rebuked for his taste in women repeatedly in the film's diegesis: by his father the Good Reverend Doctor Purify (Ossie Davis), by his wife Drew (Lonette McKee), and by a nosy, grating, black waitress played by Queen Latifah, to name a few. So condemning is Lee's treatment of Flipper and Angie's desire for one another, by the film's end, it's rendered as a drug like Gator's crack cocaine. No intrinsic, long-lasting value can be drawn from it.
This moral is the film's worst flaw. Technically, it is very accomplished, even if the central "romance" is empty and unfulfilling. There are several great acting performances, among them Ossie Davis' turn as the Good Reverend; John Turturro as a store clerk who is jilted by Angie and looks for love with an African-American woman; the great Anthony Quinn as the clerk's father who holds onto bigotry as a source of personal identity; Wesley Snipes, towering as he navigates Lee's elaborate story realm; and Samuel L. Jackson as the witty crackhead brother Gator. While on the subject of Jackson, he has revealed that he was actually addicted to crack when he learned he got the role of Gator. The judges at the Cannes Film Festival created a new award specifically to honor Jackson's vivacious acting. Ernest Dickerson functioned well as the film's director of photography, bringing vivid colors to the story. The film's music stays interesting, being a collage of mainly Stevie Wonder, Mahalia Jackson and Frank Sinatra, with a bit of vintage Public Enemy thrown in for good measure.
Some words should be allotted to mentioning the film's centerpiece, a subplot sequence wherein Flipper goes looking for his brother and ventures into a den of iniquity called the "Taj Mahal." This is a building where hundreds of crackheads go to enjoy crack, trade sex for drugs, etc. Snipes gives a singular effort with the search scenes, backed by a very well-planned soundtrack pick of Stevie Wonder's "Livin' For the City." Gator explains to Flipper that the television set Flipper's mother wants has been "smoked" away. Afterward, Jackson does a superb job of portraying the damned while Flipper treads away, and Halle Berry could be said to do a good job in her first movie role as a crack addict, if a good job constitutes growling lines like "Eat me, mother*$#@er!" Lee's drug expose should move many - a cinematic uppercut just as sobering as when Drew suggests to Flipper during an argument that "white people hate black people because they're not black." Drew's harrowing narrative of being a mixed, light-skinned black woman in a race that is obsessed with color is a tear-jerker. But Lee has no problem summoning powerful scenes. Rather, it's his inability or unwillingness to link his plot lines more cohesively that pulls down the work. As a whole, Jungle Fever remains much less captivating than the sum of its parts.
To return to the film's central issue of delusion, its most problematic viewpoint is that of extensive judgment of architect Flipper's affair with his Italian-American secretary, Angie (Annabella Sciorra). Lee's title, Jungle Fever, slyly refers to a psychological haze experienced by some people in interracial relationships. The rub comes in Lee's obvious statement on what Flipper - and perhaps all black men who are involved with white women - want, in the character's name: "Flipper Purify." Could a more ham-fisted summary be presented in film? In addition, Snipes' character is rebuked for his taste in women repeatedly in the film's diegesis: by his father the Good Reverend Doctor Purify (Ossie Davis), by his wife Drew (Lonette McKee), and by a nosy, grating, black waitress played by Queen Latifah, to name a few. So condemning is Lee's treatment of Flipper and Angie's desire for one another, by the film's end, it's rendered as a drug like Gator's crack cocaine. No intrinsic, long-lasting value can be drawn from it.
This moral is the film's worst flaw. Technically, it is very accomplished, even if the central "romance" is empty and unfulfilling. There are several great acting performances, among them Ossie Davis' turn as the Good Reverend; John Turturro as a store clerk who is jilted by Angie and looks for love with an African-American woman; the great Anthony Quinn as the clerk's father who holds onto bigotry as a source of personal identity; Wesley Snipes, towering as he navigates Lee's elaborate story realm; and Samuel L. Jackson as the witty crackhead brother Gator. While on the subject of Jackson, he has revealed that he was actually addicted to crack when he learned he got the role of Gator. The judges at the Cannes Film Festival created a new award specifically to honor Jackson's vivacious acting. Ernest Dickerson functioned well as the film's director of photography, bringing vivid colors to the story. The film's music stays interesting, being a collage of mainly Stevie Wonder, Mahalia Jackson and Frank Sinatra, with a bit of vintage Public Enemy thrown in for good measure.
Some words should be allotted to mentioning the film's centerpiece, a subplot sequence wherein Flipper goes looking for his brother and ventures into a den of iniquity called the "Taj Mahal." This is a building where hundreds of crackheads go to enjoy crack, trade sex for drugs, etc. Snipes gives a singular effort with the search scenes, backed by a very well-planned soundtrack pick of Stevie Wonder's "Livin' For the City." Gator explains to Flipper that the television set Flipper's mother wants has been "smoked" away. Afterward, Jackson does a superb job of portraying the damned while Flipper treads away, and Halle Berry could be said to do a good job in her first movie role as a crack addict, if a good job constitutes growling lines like "Eat me, mother*$#@er!" Lee's drug expose should move many - a cinematic uppercut just as sobering as when Drew suggests to Flipper during an argument that "white people hate black people because they're not black." Drew's harrowing narrative of being a mixed, light-skinned black woman in a race that is obsessed with color is a tear-jerker. But Lee has no problem summoning powerful scenes. Rather, it's his inability or unwillingness to link his plot lines more cohesively that pulls down the work. As a whole, Jungle Fever remains much less captivating than the sum of its parts.