One of these days, I’m going to have to start remedying the situation of all the Spike Lee movies I haven’t seen from earlier in his career, but at least I’ve gotten on board from Chi-Raq on in checking out his newer stuff. Da 5 Bloods is an excellent, engrossing film featuring strong performances from a lot of great actors.
Paul, Otis, Eddie, and Melvin, four Black Vietnam vets, come together for a reunion trip to Vietnam. They’re in search of the remains of their squad leader Stormin’ Norman, who was killed in action, but there’s another reason for their trip as well. Along the way, they remember the past and reckon with the various turns their lives have taken since the war.
In recent years, I’ve seen Chi-Raq, BlacKkKlansman, and now Da 5 Bloods. I really like that each film has an entirely different aesthetic and sensibility, and yet there’s something unifying threaded through all three that allows you to recognize Lee’s hand in each. In this film, much of the story comes down to the chemistry between the cast and the characters, the ways they both argue and support one another on their adventure, the ways that they’re all brothers who were bonded by their experiences even though their lives have gone in such different directions. This leads to a lot of scenes that feel very grounded, very driven by the acting, but there are also stylistic and thematic flourishes thrown in just often enough to keep you guessing: the odd soliloquy, for example, or snatches of old news footage, and I love the device of using the four older actors to still play their younger selves in the flashbacks, while Norman is preserved in his youth.
There are a lot of different themes brought up in this movie, and while that sometimes leaves you feeling like the film is pulling you in multiple directions at once, it all ultimately holds together. Naturally, there’s a lot about the plight of Americans who served in Vietnam, particularly Black Americans, both during and after the war. We address PTSD, the VA, and substance abuse, and we look at the personal and spiritual dilemma of fighting and dying overseas for another country’s freedom when the soldiers themselves are denied the same freedom in their own country. But at the same time, even though the four vets are the focal point of the story, Vietnam itself doesn’t get lost in the shuffle. We also see the war’s lingering effects on the country and its people, with a particular focus on the huge number of unexploded mines still littering the landscape. In lesser hands, it might feel like the film is trying to do too much at once, but Lee lets each thread radiate out from the connecting central story, allowing it to be complex while also giving it cohesion.
Plenty of knockout performances in this cast. Among the four vets, I especially like the tension between Delroy Lindo’s unstable Paul and Clarke Peters’s steady Otis, but Isiah Whitlock Jr. and Norm Lewis are both very good as Melvin and Eddie as well (side note: I love Norm Lewis best in musicals – that voice! Les Mis and A New Brain and The Little Mermaid, oh my! – but he adapts well to acting in front of a camera too.) The film also features a really nice performance from Jonathan Majors (Tic from Lovecraft Country) as Paul’s son David, an unexpected addition to the trip. And of course, we’re also treated to one of Chadwick Boseman’s final performances. As Norman, he plays a leader whose early death caused him to take on a somewhat mythic quality to the four vets, but Boseman’s portrayal is that of a man, not a hero, and I like how Boseman navigates the divide between the two.
Warnings
Violence (including some gore,) language (including the N-word and racial slurs,) drinking/smoking, sexual references, disturbing images, and strong thematic elements.
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