Da Five Bloods
(2020) Dir: Spike Lee
Da Five Bloods is the latest Spike Lee Joint and is premiering exclusively on Netflix worldwide. It tells the story of 4 black Vietnam vets who return to the jungle, decades after the war has ended, to search for their fallen brother’s remains and the treasure buried with him.
Opening with historic footage of Muhammad Ali and Malcolm X along with news footage and film clips from the Vietnam War era, detailing the struggles the American black populace faced both at home and at war abroad, you know you’re watching a Spike Lee Joint and that this is going to be a fresh take on the Vietnam War genre. Throughout the movie we’re treated to tales of real life black war heroes (dating right back to the Boston massacre of 1770), stories of the struggles the black community
The stellar cast all excel, although much like the tone and narrative, some characters are given much more to do and are more fully developed than others. Chadwick Boseman exudes enough charisma to convince as the young inspirational figure to the Bloods. Jonathan Majors also turns the comic relief into something more. But it’s Delroy Lindo who threatens to steal the show, starting out as a grumpy curmudgeon and slowly revealing much darker and more hysteric sides to his inner psyche while still being able to flip back to loving father or jolly friend when he threatens to be going so cruel as to turn off the audience.
An interesting decision was to use the same actors as their younger selves during the Vietnam flashbacks (shot on beautifully grainy 16mm), without CGI de-aging a la Netflix’s recent critical hit The Irishman. Which I felt worked quite well as they’re flashbacks, so it makes sense that the vets would see themselves as their older selves while Norm is still the same age as he never got to grow any older having been killed in Vietnam.
And whilst it doesn’t shy away from the atrocities committed by both sides in the Vietnam War and delves deep into all of the vets' PTSD, the trauma they faced over there have haunted each of them in different ways, it’s also a lot of fun. Featuring hilarious dance sequences and kinetic jungle shootouts. The standout set piece being a very shocking and tense sequence involving a minefield.
Unfortunately, the film can feel a bit messy and disjointed at times. It felt like two movies merged together at times as it would switch from comedy heist adventure to heavy violence, drama and sibering ruminations on war and the aftermath of which, on a dime.
It feels redundant to criticise Spike Lee for being self-indulgent at this stage, so while he does indulge a lot, if you go with it, Da Five Bloods is both highly entertaining and at times deeply moving too.