Chi-raq

**Spoiler Alert**

Director: Spike Lee/Starring: Teyonah Parris, Nick Cannon, Samuel L. Jackson, John Cusack, Wesley Snipes, Angela Bassett, Jennifer Hudson, D.B. Sweeney and Dave Chappelle

One never knows what Spike Lee will come up with though it's a sure thing that the subject matter will focus on African-American issues, of which he has many trenchant things to say and express. In his latest film, he combines social commentary with drama, farce and song and dance and achieves a synthesis that is imaginative, informative and ultimately entertaining. Chi-raq may be his most inspired film in years and most daring, as he not only adapts Aristophanes' Lysistrata, he also turns it on its head by setting in present day Chicago.

Aristophanes' play; set during the Peloponnesian War, tells the story of a group of women, led by Lysistrata, who attempt to end the bloody conflict by refusing their men sex. Lee's story takes place on a different battlefield; one just as violent and bloody: the gang wars in Chicago's streets. As the wars rage in the streets, bodies of bystanders begin to accrue until Lysistrata (Teyonah Parris) decides she has seen enough. Though the story is Aristophanes', the conflict depicted in Lee's film is drawn from recent events in Chicago. What distinguishes Lee's film from the Greek dramatist's is how he chooses to tell his story. What they have in common is the theme of female empowerment.

One may immediately notice, from the film's opening lines, is the dialogue, which is declaimed in a rhyming, lyrical manner that is faithful to both Aristophanes and hip-hop.

Subtitles at the beginning of the film offer the audience sobering statistics about the casualties of gang violence on Chicago streets, whose numbers exceed the total number of casualties from both the Afghanistan and Iraqi wars.
Chicago, or Chi-raq; as its referred to by city inhabitants, is the battleground of two warring gangs: the Spartans and the Trojans. Lysistrata's boyfriend and local rap star; Chi-raq (Nick Cannon), is the Spartan leader whose forces battle the Trojans and their leader Cyclops (Wesley Snipes).

Serving as the story's narrator is the hip Dolmedes (Samuel Jackson); who appears periodically in immaculate duds to help the narrative along.

Fed up with the death toll from the Spartan/Trojan gun battles, Lysistrata conceives the aforementioned plan whereby the women from both sides of the conflict deny their men sex as a radical approach to ending the violence. Thinking they can merely transfer their amorous activities elsewhere, the men find all the women in the community; including strip clubs, have joined Lysistrata's strike as well. Denied their carnal pleasures, the men try to turn the tables on the women only to find Lysistrata has organized the women only too well. Before long, she and her women army seize control of an armory.

As Lysistrata's plan takes effect the men scramble to find a way to free themselves from the lockout. Joining the call for a cessation to the violence is Father Mike Corridan (John Cusack); a white clergyman who is sympathetic to Lysistrata's plan. Corridan's emotionally-charged sermon at a funeral honoring a gang-war casualty serves also as an invective about the problem of gun-related violence in black, urban America. Meanwhile, Lysistrata finds her movement has become a national and international phenomenon.

Though we see several dance numbers where Spartan and Trojan women shake their booty provocatively, Lee never lets us forget the very serious issue at the heart of the film.
And though Lysistrata's solution to the violence is fanciful at best, it makes for a terrific premise for a film, which Lee exploits not only for maximum entertainment but to express a cogent message.

Chi-raq shows how Lee can be a feverishly-imaginative director. Setting Aristophanes' play in modern day Chicago and substituting a gang-war for the Peloponnesian conflict is refreshingly original.

Teyonah Parris is a delightful Lysistrata; her scalding sexuality and powerful presence make the men seem boyish. We don't often have a chance to see Angela Bassett in films, but here she is quite terrific and lends her own stalwart presence to the proceedings.
I suppose Lee could have knocked twenty minutes or so off the running time but that's a minor quibble. Some critics I've read think John Cusack's sermon is a significant mistake but I understand Lee must have felt a funeral oration delivered by a white man might make a more powerful impact. I haven't made up my mind about it but I didn't find it to be a glaring error (if it is one).

I took Lee's message to heart but also had a great time watching a movie that employed multiple-genre conventions to to forge its own significant, interpretation of Aristophanes. I think it was a mistake to release it during big-screen spectacle season but maybe it will hold its own. We can only hope.

The Expendables 3

**Spoiler Alert--wait a minute, is this really necessary, what exactly will I spoil?**

Director: Patrick Hughes/Starring: Sylvester Stallone, Jason Statham, Antonio Banderas, Harrison Ford, Arnold Schwarzeneggar, Mel Gibson, Wesley Snipes, Jet Li, Dolph Lundgren, Randy Couture, Kelsey Grammer, Terry Crews, Victor Ortiz, Ronda Rousey, Kellan Lutz and anyone who happened to visit the studio during filming

I was thinking of creating a separate post for the cast list but oh well. I seriously thought about skipping The Expendables 3 because I had already invested enough time and money in the first two movies, which were mildly fun but very disposable. But I reconsidered; after all, I managed to see all the Harry Potter movies in theaters and perplexed myself by doing the same with the Twilight series, so why not the Expendables?

There is something about the movie that renders it impervious to any criticism. It's inherently dumb and all involved are well aware it's a farce so how can one possibly pan it? That said, I can say I didn't come to bury it but I also won't recommend the movie unless one's Verizon Fios is on the fritz, you have nothing to read, your iPad has lost its charge, Seven Samurai can't be found on any movie channel, you're too lazy to play frisbee at the park (do people still do that?), you finished digging a trench for a sprinkler system, or it's just too early to turn in. Then maybe I'd recommend The Expendables 3, but only at matinee prices.

The Expendables 3 begins with a daring rescue by the core members of the Expendable team: Barney Ross (Sylvester Stallone), Lee Christmas (Jason Statham), Gunnar Jensen (Dolph Lundgren), Caesar (Terry Crews) and Toll Road (Randy Couture) as they break into a maximum security prison in some third world country to rescue a fellow member who has been incarcerated for 7 years. The feat is accomplished in true Expendables fashion by commandeering a train and crashing through the doors of a concrete fortress. The liberated member is Doc (Wesley Snipes); a former Expendables medic and like Lee, a bad-ass knife-wielder.

The team is hired by a government suit named Drummer (Harrison Ford) for a mission involving a Somali port, but are thwarted by a former associate of Ross' named Stonebanks (Mel Gibson), who is now an arms dealer operating outside the purview of international law. Stonebanks manages to escape but not before wounding Caesar by sniping at him from a helicopter--an act meant to humiliate Ross.

Irked by Ross' failed mission, Drummer offers him a redemptive opportunity to lead a mission to capture Stonebanks, who is holed up in a third world despot's stronghold somewhere on the Asian continent.

Feeling his group has aged beyond optimum functionality and afraid to imperil their lives in another mission, Ross dismisses his group. They naturally reject his edict but Ross is adamant, brooking no objections.

While his former unit lick their emotional wounds, Ross searches for a new group; assisted by a whizbang recruiter named Bonaparte (Kelsey Grammer). The new unit comes with a specific array of skills but also a she-tough named Luna (MMA Fighter Ronda Rousey). The youngsters manage to get themselves captured by Stonebanks and his client's army in a rubble-strewn, cold war-esque complex. Stonebanks then goads Ross into rescuing the unit.

The rest of the story is hardly mysterious. You know Christmas, Doc, Jensen, and Road will find a way to re-join Ross, which will provide them a means to show their testosteronic (my word) virility. And of course everyone in the cast will have his allotted time onscreen.

You might be delusional if you think E3 offers any narrative surprises. Seeing the film is like a visit to McDonald's--one expects nothing but the traditional fare. It would be unseemly to complain about the absence of McFoie Gras in the chain's gustatory offerings. The same can be said for E3. What you see and titter at in the first film is precisely what fatigues your eyes in the third, so why expect more?

Sure, the movie is ferociously meat-headed and only a smidgen less cartoonish than a computer game, but with its phonebook cast and bloodless mayhem (I think I saw more people bleed in The Hundred-Foot Journey), it all went down like a bag of Cheetos. At least The Expendables 3 has a sense of humor, which prevented its fall into the abyss of self-serious tedium.

Does the franchise have one more bullet in its chamber? Is Expendables 4 a possibility? If so, I would like the producers to cast some of the few people on the planet who haven't appeared in the franchise. I would like to see Judy Dench play a blood-thirsty MI6 operative with demolition expertise who returns from Ross' past to liquidate him after steamy hot-tub sex. Maybe Julie Andrews and Dame Maggie Smith could make appearances too...in the hot-tub.
That's all.