Malcolm X

This movie is everything. I'm being so serious when I say I loved everything about this film. The good outweighs the bad so much for me that I can excuse any imperfections. From the intro to the death of Malcolm, it is stellar. The mere fact that Denzel Washington didn't win Best Actor at the 65th Academy Awards was mind-blowing. I've never seen Scent of a Woman with Al Pacino, but something just doesn't sit right with me. .Let's start with the intro, chills, literal chills. The line "You're not an American, you are the victim of America. You didn't have a choice coming over here. He didn't say, "Black man, Black woman, come on over and help me build America." He said, "**, get down in the bottom of that boat, and I'm taking you over there to help me build America." Being born here does not make you an American. I'm not an American. You're not an American. You are one of twenty-two million Black people who are the victims of America." is a perfect way to kick off this film. The slow-burning of the American flag in the X is the perfect cherry on top. .Now you have your main characters: Malcolm X - Denzel Washington, Betty Shabazz - Angela Bassett, Shorty- Spike Lee, Baines - Albert Hall, and the honorable Elijah Muhammed - Al Freeman Jr. Now I think this might have been one of the best castings. Everyone has their standouts, and I think one of the best examples of that is Angel Bassett when Malcolm is assassinated. That initial scream when he is shot in the chest, to yelling to call an ambulance even though he is 100% gone, and ending with that bone-chilling cry is fantastic. It's surprising to me that she did not even get nominated for Best Actress for the Academy Awards as well. . Speaking of Malcolm getting shot, I want to talk about how great of a sequence it is (not great that he got shot, but in a filmography sense, lol). First, we start with Malcolm, his friends, his family, and his killers driving to his sermon. Not only is the song "A Change is Coming" a hint to his death, but the shot of them setting up his sermon makes it feel like we are watching officers setting up for the death penalty. Then we get that Dolby zoom shot of Malcolm, making us the viewer feel uneasy. Not to mention the lady who says she recognizes Malcolm but then promotes Jesus Christ in a Christian format. A clear representation of how we often know who people are but do not truly know them. We move on to Malcolm taking a while in his dressing room. He knows that he is likely to be killed; it's just a matter of when. And when he does walk out onto that stage and the shooter runs up to the stage with a shotgun, he smiles at that moment. Malcolm's death was not something he was scared of; he knew death would be upon him, and when he was killed, his family would have their burden removed. His smile at that moment was due to his killers; they weren't something like the KKK who had murdered his father but members of the Nation of Islam. They weren't black Christians; they were black Muslims, the people he gave a voice for. And once he lies dead and lies on the floor and gets shot repeatedly, his followers do what was being done to them. They hunt down the shooters, in this case, Giancarlo Esposito. They chase him down the stairs and do whatever it takes to grab him. Giancarlo tries to escape, but they grab him by his coat and take him outside. He is punched over and over again. It feels like a pack of dogs attacking their prey. Giancarlo crawls out but is quickly dragged back in; he's choked, bruised, and begging for mercy. Ironically, it's the white police officers who save him from being murdered by this angry mob. Now, what he did was not right, of course, but the fact that it mirrors how white people may have treated black people to some degree is just such a strong message. It shows the human experience, that hate is in our DNA, and sometimes it can't be controlled, and in some moments we appear non-human. .That scene alone is enough to make this movie a 5/5 for me, and I am adding it to my top 4. The message is strong and heavily prevalent as it is A Spike Lee Joint. There are so many other iconic scenes and lines; I'll throw some out now. The prison hair scene, Malcolm's pilgrimage to Mecca, the hospital march, and so on. It's three and a half hours of quality information and entertainment. Spike Lee does such a good job making a movie fun to watch while actually getting something out of it. .I'm still upset that Denzel Washington didn't win anything at the Academy Awards. The whole delivery is iconic and should be a film that everyone needs at some point. Even if you aren't Muslim or black like me (A Roman Catholic Mexican American), there is a lesson for all of us to know. As I said 5/5, there is just so much here I like and I can't even fit all of it into this review which I apologize for already yapping so much.