It's a very convenient time for Spike Lee to be releasing Da 5 Bloods isn't it? Nobody with ties to their career would ever come out and say anything other than it was the best thing they had ever seen made by anyone and that is precisely what is happening with professional reviewers. They are calling it a "Masterpiece" and "quite possibly Spike Lee's greatest film in his already sterling selection of movies."
And the rave reviews go on and on and on.
The trailer looked amazing as we were to see 4 adult African Americans return to Vietnam where they all fought together during the Vietnam war. During the Vietnam war things were very different for blacks in America and their return to "visit" a country that they now have friendly relations with seems like a cocktail laden vacation until a different destination, one to retrieve a hidden treasure, is revealed to us. This all happens in the first 10 minutes.
The movie get's weird and difficult to follow at this point. The old fells have flashbacks to their time as soliders in 'Nam, but in said flashbacks, they are all the same age as they are now, the only person who is 40 years younger, is their friend "Norman" who got killed in the war. There are those that will say that this was artistic and intentional and I certainly hope so, but it doesn't make a great deal of sense. Neither does the original scenario that lead to them knowing where this buried treasure is in the first place.
In the flashback scene (where all the present day soldiers are the same age as they are today) land they are shot down by a group of Vietcong in the hillside, the "enemy" doesn't seem to have much in the way of tactics because after being shot down and the pilot killed the remaining 5 "bloods" quite easily dispatch the forces, who have an advantageous position on them and have them pinned down. I'm no military expert, but there has never been a military situation that went down like this. The bloods had no cover, limited ammo, were outnumbered, and didn't know the enemy position... yet the enemy just runs away.
I don't expect spot on realism in my films but this is just absurd and a bad way to start a war film. Unfortunately, any scene with bullets that happens later in the movie don't get much better as we are plagued with guns that never run out of ammo, incompetent enemies, and of course the fact that our heroes are practically invincible.
There is also a completely ridiculous scene where one of the main hero's son has stepped on a landmine and they are able to save him but tying a rope to him and pulling real hard! Because that is how landmines work! Think of all the lives that could have been saved if we had just thought of this years ago!
It is also worth noting that in many of these scenes there are white people that are part of their crew including in the helicopter crash scene and they are killed, and not at all mourned. Later, there are some white people working for a charity in Vietnam that help them, and da 5 bloods just treat them like shit the whole time. What's the artistic angle we are going for here Spike?
Spike Lee also took some time to make jabs at this current year's political scenery, which I suppose shouldn't be so surprising since his bias is already very well-known.
The funny thing is that the press are just lining up to lick Lee's boots to tell him how incredible this movie is, which was always going to happen: Can you imagine what would happen to someone's career if they were to say that the acting was wooden, the representation of modern-day Vietnam inaccurate, the war scenes were impractical if not impossible, and that the overall story is just cliche? That person would get called racist - even though what he or she is saying is actually true.
Don't take my word for it though. Go watch this film yourself and see if you can make it the whole way through without touching the remote. This is no masterpiece but I can guarantee that in the coming days the divide between the professional critics ratings and user ratings are going to be very different numbers
