Retro Film Review: Clockers (1995)

One of the most significant Hollywood trends in early 1990s were films dealing with sad realities of drug-infested black inner city neighbourhoods, many of them made by black film makers. By mid 1990s the novelty wore off and saturation effect began to hurt even the most talented and most respected film makers who would tackle those subjects. One of the examples could be seen in Clockers, 1995 crime drama directed by Spike Lee.

Clockers is based on the award-winning novel by Richard Price, author who had spent months in drug-infested neighbourhoods of New Jersey in order to gain inspiration and material for the story. When Price adapted his book to the screen, the plot was moved to the equally drug-infested neighbourhoods of Brooklyn, a place where the only profitable activity seems to be distribution of crack cocaine. This business is done through "benches" - places where customers can buy such merchandise 24 hours a day street from low-level pushers, known as "clockers". One of such "clockers" is Ronald Dunham a.k.a. "Strike" (played by Mekhi Phifer), young employee in the organisation led by local drug lord Rodney Little (played by Delroy Lindo). Despite earning good money, "Strike" would aspires for higher position within organisation, and the opportunity comes when Rodney marks a local store manager for execution. The man is soon found murdered, but Rocco Clein (played by Harvey Keitel), NYPD detective has seemingly routine case complicated after surprise confession by Strike's brother Victor (played by Isaiah Washington). Victor is hard-working family man and model citizen without any obvious motives for the murder, so Clein refuses to believe that the confession might be true. Instead he is convinced that Victor took fall for his brother, so he starts pressing "Strike" to turn his boss.

Spike Lee in Clockers, just like Oliver Stone in Natural Born Killers one year earlier, became obsessed with the idea to show even the blind among his audience how unconventional director he was. This determination led to the use of irritating rap music and many MTV-style camera and editing tricks - all of them not serving any artistic purposes. However, the script by Eric Price proved too good to be seriously damaged by this orgy of 1990s larpourlartism. Characters are well-drawn and stereotypical divide between heroes and villains is avoided. One of the examples can be seen in the sight of all-white police detectives - people who are supposed to represent forces of Good - cracking racist jokes over the body of young black victim of drugs-related homicide. But the best job is done by actors, especially young Phifer in the complex role of street dealer, troubled both by his conscience and stomach ulcer. Harvey Keitel also provides great performance in his role of a world-weary detective, while Delroy Lindo again shows great charisma as a character closest to the classic concept of villain. In the end, such strong performances are reason enough for the audience to endure 129 minutes of Clockers and see one of great American film makers being better in his failure than many others in their triumphs.

RATING: 6/10 (++)

(Note: The text in its original form was posted in Usenet newsgroup rec.arts.movies.reviews on February 1st 2003)

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Movie URL: https://www.themoviedb.org/movie/20649-clockers
Critic: AA