In the summer of 1977, a serial killer who called himself Son of Sam (real name David Berkowitz) held New York City in terror as he went on a killing spree, periodically writing letters to New York's media in which he took full responsibility for the murders and made clear that he intended to kill again. Spike Lee's Summer of Sam deals in part with this crime spree, but it mostly looks back at the fearful impact of his crimes on New York's collective consciousness. Vinny and Dionna (John
Leguizamo and Mira Sorvino) are an unhappy young married couple living in the Bronx; Vinny often cheats on Dionna but is wracked with guilt about it, while Dionna fears she lacks the looks or allure to hold onto a man. Ritchie (Adrien Brody) is a neighborhood kid turned punk rocker (complete with a fake British accent); he has a band and a girlfriend (Jennifer Esposito) but also makes money as an exotic dancer at a gay club. And Luigi (Ben Gazzara), a longtime leader of organized crime in the Bronx, is approached by the police, with whom he generally has a less cordial relationship, to help them find the killer, as the citizens of some neighborhoods barricade their streets in fear that he will strike there next. Meanwhile, a tortured psychopath named David Berkowitz (Michael Badalucco) seethes with rage in his gloomy apartment and receives messages from a demonic dog who commands him to kill and kill again. Spike Lee's first film without a primarily African-American cast (though bearing the unmistakable New York stamp that's one of his hallmarks), Summer of Sam was shown as part of the Directors Fortnight series at the 1999 Cannes Film Festival. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi
Lee is a powerful filmmaker who certainly knows how to have an impact on an audience, but those who survive his ministrations are likely to wonder if in this case the battle was worth the bruises.
This ultimately disappoints, but it is good to see Lee branch out into subjects which don't immediately lend themselves to his single-minded politicizing.
Whatever you think of Spike Lee, when he has the faith in his talent and material and is able to be political without the dogma, he's one of the best filmmakers to come out of America in the 1980's.
The story makes very important points, and shows us a graphic parable of the wages of sin. But the ugliness along the way will be too much for some viewers....
Both beguiling and confounding, an enigmatic blend of banality and brilliance that ultimately manages to overcome its myriad shortcomings through nothing but the sheer force of Lee's visionary direction.
Know what? I bet that Spike Lee would make a really brilliant zombie movie. He really excels at crafting stories about groups of characters caught in circumstances that bring out the worst in everyone. This movie reminds me a lot of Do The Right Thing, but it's made twelve years after and set ten years before. I was
surprised (though perhaps I shouldn't have been) that this movie spent so little time with David Berkowitz himself and so much more with all the characters made paranoid and hostile to each other in the wake of his insane and random murders. The Son of Sam murders have fostered an atmosphere of suspicion that leads former friends and people who've grown up together to mistrust each other, form vicious little in-groups and turn on other people to make themselves feel more secure. Not unlike in The Walking Dead. These characters seem really three-dimensional and real to me, and everyone's motivations, while sometimes despicable, are at the very least understandable. I really like the way Ruby and Ritchie get into the burgeoning CBGB's punk scene and come together, and I really liked Vinny and Dionna as the profoundly unhappily married couple trying to repair their strained relationship. Are they even compatible? I love this movie. It's so human and so big, and Spike Lee tells the story with a real sense of flair and zeitgeist.
On a scene by scene basis this film is alright, but it is a mess when taken as a whole. It's like the filmmakers came in with twenty ideas and a clumsy script that does not fully develop any of them. This leaves confusion as to what message Spike Lee was trying to convey. There are moments of brilliance in this
movie, accompanied by some good acting. The most noteworthy performance is Adrien Brody. Yet for every moment of brilliance, there are tedious elements that prevent the film from being great. The relationship sub-plot with John Leguizamo's character feels like a very bad soap-opera that is only related to the Son of Sam killings by sheer coincidence. This sub-plot is a time-killer that doesn't add to the overall story. Plus there are some characters that are too cartoonish to be taken as real people, which counteracts the gritty realism Spike Lee is trying to achieve. If Spike Lee had taken the time to refine the script and made it less crowded this movie could have been really great. As it is, it is a mixed bag.
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