A Glimpse Into Spike Lee’s Psychedelic ‘Da 5 Bloods’

An homage to (and subversion of) the Vietnam film.

Following 2018’s BlacKkKlansmen, Spike Lee’s latest project —Da 5 Bloodssimilarly sets out to interrogate the historical archive. The trailer, released today, is an ode to the late ’60s in all their flamboyance; The Chamber Brothers’ Time Has Come Today (soundtracked throughout) underscores an era of upheaval, dissonance, culture and counterculture. Lee ruminates on the ’60s and early ’70s, nostalgic yet critical, delving into a war-torn America.

Da 5 Bloods enters and depicts the lives of four African American veterans, Paul (Delroy Lindo), Otis (Clarke Peters), Eddie (Norm Lewis) and Melvin (Isiah Whitlock, Jr.), as they set out to return to Vietnam to uncover the remains of their previous squad leader (Chadwick Boseman). The narrative, portrayed anachronistically, juxtaposes vintage war footage with the characters’ current undertaking. Dispersed throughout are shots of the Nixon resignation, Kent State protests, among other events embodying a period rife with conflict.

Hannah Hanoi, based on a historically accurate Vietnamese broadcast personality, poignantly asks “Black GI: is it fair to serve more than the white Americans who send you here? Nothing is more confused than to be ordered into a war to die without the faintest idea of what’s going on. I dedicate this next record to the Soul Brothers of the First Infantry Divisions. Be safe.

Such is the making of a Spike Lee feature: a blunt confrontation of a past (and present) embedded with racial tensions, alongside the problematized nature of its disavowal. Far from subtle commentary, or revisionist history, Da 5 Bloods sets out to address questions left unanswered, as pressing now as then. 

The film is set to be released on Netflix on June 12.

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