She's Gotta Have It

So I finally got around to seeing the debut from auteur Spike Lee. I felt as though I knew the film before seeing it after reading an interesting history about it in John Pierson's "Spike, Mike, Slackers & Dykes". If you're a fan of independent cinema, you should check out both the book and film.

Spike's familiar style and approach is evident in this early indication of a talented filmmaker. Whatever shortcomings that revealed themselves were largely unavoidable in such a low budget outing, and usually quickly forgivable.

The film's testimony approach often gave characters some depth and clearly gave the film a more intimate relationship with the audience, but at times hurt the film with some unfortunate bad acting from names you never heard before and probably never will again. Again, not Spike's fault. It does include one of my buddy's favourite pick-up lines, "Baby, I'd drink a whole tub of your bath water." I'm sure most women would appreciate that sentiment as the way to their heart.

Spike's sister and father have small roles which must say something about the man's admirable family pride. Of course, with many of his films, it seems Spike can't resist the allure of the space in front of the camera while controlling all that's behind it. Not many directors divide their energy in such a manner, but some of the most notorious directors of our time do. Whether this divides their focus in a negative aspect or not is difficult to say. But if it's a distraction or handicap, Spike seems to be managing fine

But even now I haven't stated either way if it's a good, recommendable film or not. It's largely in black and white, which is a turn off for non-film lovers. I once overheard some one say of "Schindler's List", "It's a really good film, even though it's black and white." I'm sure with some films the inclusion of colour can enhance the enjoyment of the film, but some things are not meant to be in colour, some things are better without it. Films like this one are only possible in black and white due to budget restraints. Whenever I see the efforts of some colourization nightmare, it makes my stomach turn, but I digress.

What can I say, I am a film lover, and I enjoyed it. If you fall in the same category, you probably will too.

This is a completely unique, humorous, sexy film from Spike Lee -- his first cinematic effort, using his friends from NYU film school as actors. He himself plays the role of eccentric Mars, one of heroine Nola darling's three lovers. Though I'm sure Lee wouldn't describe himself as a feminist, this film looks at so-called "promiscuity" from a distinctly liberated point of view. Perhaps women need more than one man, he wonders, because it takes several men to make up a complete person! The film is set in a rarely seen milieu, that of artistic, well-educated, middle-class, quirky urban African-Americans (like the view of black Chicago in "Love Jones"). It would be fascinating from that standpoint, even it if didn't display such ruefully witty characterizations of egotistical, clueless men.

You could spend an afternoon in far worse fashion than to rent this film, and view Lee's naked talent shining through in a film whose cost probably wouldn't pay the catering bill for one of his film projects these days. The fact that it is filmed almost entirely in black and white adds to its authenticity and charm.

"She's Gotta Have It" was the beginning of an illustrious career for filmmaker Spike Lee. It starred Tracy Camilla Johns as the sex driven Nola Darling. Her three men were played by Tommy Redmond Hicks, John Canada Terrell and Spike Lee. All the three men had certain traits that stood out. Jamie Street (Hicks) is cool, calm and caring towards Nola. Greer Childs (Terrell) was the obnoxious, stuck up, rude pseudo black man that thought he was better than anyone else. And last but not least was Mars Blackmon (Lee), he was funny and outgoing. Annoying at times but his wit could win you over. This film is full of memorable one liners like "please baby baby baby please" and much more. This film was heavily criticized for it's depiction of women (like all of Spike's films), lesbians (the character Opal) and the reality of it. But nonetheless, "She's Gotta Have It" opened in 1986 to rave reviews and grossed 7 million dollars (not a lot but it is amazing compared to the thousands it took to make it). What made this film a gem is that you don't find characters like these anymore. They all had something about them that was hard to resist. Mars Blackmon became so famous that he was reprised by Lee in Nike Air Jordan commercials with the great Michael Jordan, airing from 1988 to 1995 (the Nola character also appeared in one Air Jordan commercial with Mars Blackmon, the commercial only aired once). "She's Gotta Have It" is a decent start for a young filmmaker and a must see for those that haven't seen it.

She's Gotta Have It- Rated R *** out of ****

In Brooklyn, Nola Darling dislikes commitment and she has three lovers at the same time. Jamie Overstreet is sweet and looking for a lifelong companion. Greer Childs is a self-obsessed model. Mars Blackmon (Spike Lee) is a loud-mouth childman. Nola, her friends and family narrate the movie talking directly into the camera. Opal Gilstrap is a lesbian who likes Nola. Her free-love policy runs into trouble when the three men discover each other's relationship with Nola.

This is Spike Lee's first full-length feature as a writer/director and he is also a major supporting actor. This announces the arrival of a new American cinematic voice. It's inventive and different. Sure the actors are mostly amateurs but everybody has a good charismatic energy. Spike Lee is bringing a lot of different elements into this movie. Most impressively, he has turned the normal sexual relationship between man and woman upside-down. It is a great debut and an imaginative indie.

I read one review on here that labeled She's Gotta Have it as Spike Lee's 'feminist view'. I would agree with this in part because he doesn't show anything- the characters really- on any one side. We see her follies completely. But I think there is a male view going on with his look at these characters too; after we see how a woman can be all liberated and free of being too restricted with who she wants to love/fool around with, there's more of a sympathy going on for the men too as the situation starts to come down to an essential thing- what does Nola REALLY want? By the end of the picture, no one can really say for certain, Nola most of all, but all the while Lee has given us a look at romance that is ordinary only in how some of the typical characteristics of men and women are portrayed at times. But really, it's also out of the ordinary on showing the little things that wouldn't get into the common romantic comedy. It's a little too loosely structured and the style isn't altogether great, but it has as much ambition as Scorsese's Who's That Knocking or Bertolucci's Before the Revolution, at least in trying to convey subject matter primarily through style.

Not to say the substance is left unchecked- in fact for the most part it's one of Lee's sharpest satires on the troubles of the sexes, and the main characters are a bit more believable than those of the main white/black couple of Jungle Fever. Lee boils it downs to seeming essentials at first- Nola (Tracy Camilla Johns, not bad at all if not as strong as the main 'heroine' could be) is a magazine painter, but really its her romantic life that keeps her usually occupied. We see the various attempts of various male 'pick-up lines' (which is pretty hilarious, if dated), and then we meet guy #1, Jamie (Tommy Hicks, maybe the best 'real' actor of the group), who is really the nice guy, the kind that any reasonable woman would consider probably marrying sooner or later. But she also has male #2, Greer (John Canada Turrell, with a great, shallow look to him if not overall performance), who is a male model who is meticulously egotistical even with folding up his clothes before sex. And then there's #3, Mars Blackmon (Lee himself, in uproariously huge glasses and his name etched out in gold across his neck, surely one of his most wonderful characters played by him), who is the jokester, and word-spinner, and always takes a while to get around in a conversation.

So around and around she goes, and it's really only until the last twenty minutes when Nola finally has to come down and make the decision- and it perhaps will have to come down to the 'right' decision- but for what she just can't tell. Part of it is that she just loves sex, which becomes a problem when she invites over the three men for thanksgiving (not a totally successful scene, mainly due to the dialog and pacing, but still a nice job in awkward tension). And also a problem when Jamie, the nice guy, makes an ultimatum for Nola. At the same time in the background there is the unusual tension of a possible lesbian affair with Opal (Raye Dowell, very good in her scenes), but nothing comes to it. Scenes like those, where the sexual and relationship-type boundaries come into question, are really interesting. The self-conscious talking-to-the-camera interview bits range from excellent to just OK though, and sort of mark the quality of the film down a peg, even as the characters get to share some of their inner thoughts (Lee's being the funniest).

What then makes Lee's film a big step above any other number of films out there, primarily in the Hollywood mainstream, about a woman who has trouble deciding what to do with herself? It's two things; one, that the men are probably just as interesting with what they have going on as her, if not more so for Jamie, and two, the cinematic techniques imposed by Lee and cinematographer Ernest Dickerson. The latter of those two helps make She's Gotta Have it even more of a light-hearted picture than it might have been if just filmed as the script is. We get the images first put to Lee's father Bill's score, which is definitely one of his best after Do the Right Thing. Then the images get a lot of invention on such a small budget, unusually intimate and creative camera angles (I loved the bit when we see in slow-motion the extreme close-ups of Mars getting close with Nola), the lighting often very expressionistic, and sometimes the editing going to playful, odd lengths like the sex scene between Nola and Greer. Sometimes the playfulness and first-time filmmaker amazement is a little much, like the color film sequence, which is beautiful but almost better self-contained than with the black & white grittiness of the rest of the film. I also could've done without the last bit after the denouement where all the actors say their names with the clapper. Nevertheless the stylistic merits add a lot to make it a richer film in context and structure.

But if you can seek it out, especially in widescreen (I saw it on IFC, though I wish I could see the director's cut to see what was cut out, however explicit it might be), it's well worth it. It's a small film, yet one that brings up some intriguing bits about what it means to really love someone vs. desire them, and what mind-games go on between men & women, men & men, women & women, and where the middle-ground could be, if at all. A minor independent/debut classic. A-