Miracle at St Anna.

"Miracle at St Anna will doubtless be extolled by people who mistake [Spike] Lee's righteous clobbering for moral seriousness," writes David Edelstein in New York. "But compare any scene to Rachid Bouchareb's Indigènes (stupidly retitled Days of Glory in the US), in which Algerians - French citizens - fight for a country that gives them no rights: The storytelling is measured, the encounters glancing but rich, the violence more devastating for its restraint. Compare the Taviani brothers' sublime Night of the Shooting Stars, in which comedy bleeds into tragedy and the characters have so much stature you can't believe they're killing one another so absurdly. Lee's climax is part punishing bloodbath, part florid religious uplift, and the coda is so maladroit it's hard to believe anyone on-set could keep a straight face."

Updated through 9/27.

Noel Murray at the AV Club: "This pains me to write, because I'm a lifelong fan of Spike Lee's, and I think his recent run of films (25th Hour, Inside Man, When The Levees Broke) has been downright inspiring, but Miracle at St Anna is a botch of the first order, a movie that telegraphs its leadenness in its first 10 minutes, and departs two-and-a-half hours later having left behind maybe two or three memorable scenes."

"Lee's noble attempt to create a World War II drama with African American soldiers fails to create a compelling narrative, marred as it is by forced melodrama and a shoddy screenplay that sounds like some kind of second rate pulp novel from the 50s," writes Eric Kohn at the Jaman Blog. "The director undoubtedly qualifies as one of the finest American filmmakers of the last 30 years, but he might work better on his home turf."

"There are moments here where the film does not work, where you can feel the sharp needle of disbelief or dislocation puncture the film mercilessly, and there are other moments that are not only willing but indeed eager to look at big, challenging, relevant issues of race and power, war and justice, faith and failure," writes James Rocchi at Cinematical. "These moments - and there are many of them - not only speak to Lee's unwavering skill and commitment as a filmmaker, but also to the singular nature of his talent and will. When Miracle at St Anna falters, it's in the moments that seem like they could have been crafted by any other filmmaker; when Miracle at St Anna succeeds, it's in the moments that could only have been crafted by Lee."

Nicolas Rapold talks with Lee for the New York Sun.

Updates, 9/24: "Whatever Miracle at St Anna was intended to be - suppressed history revealed, a studio-era trench ensemble throwback, a war movie patchwork borrowing heavily from the kid-in-war subgenre - it fails rather spectacularly," argues Benjamin H Sutton in the L Magazine.

"Mr Lee has stretched his material in so many different directions that one is left with unacceptable levels of religiosity and sentimentality in the overall context of the naked brutality we have witnessed," writes Andrew Sarris in the New York Observer.

"While the cast is uniformly excellent, it's worth highlighting [Matteo] Sciabordi's moving and underplayed turn - it's one of the best juvenile performances in recent memory," writes Alonso Duralde at MSNBC. "More's the pity, then, that those great moments are ultimately outweighed by the ones that don't work, all the way to the would-be tearjerking climax. Lee's creative passion is apparent throughout Miracle at St Anna, but the screenplay lets him, and the audience, down."

"[Y]ou may begin to wonder if Lee really initiated this project or if it only fell into his hands after Roberto Benigni proved unavailable." Scott Foundas in the Voice.

Quick updates, 9/26: "Spike Lee is awkwardly caught between nobility and pulp with his latest, Miracle at St Anna," writes Michael Koresky at Reverse Shot. "The film plays minute to minute like a Sam Fuller-esque two-fister, but those minutes add up, incongruously, to one hell of a ponderous super-sized epic, overflowing with unnecessary subplots and punched up to inglorious heights of excess."

"[S]etting the record straight after so many years and so many movies is not necessarily a simple undertaking, and this film sometimes stumbles under its heavy, self-imposed burden of historical significance," writes AO Scott in the New York Times.

More from Jay Antani (Slant), Roger Ebert (Chicago Sun-Times), Brandon Fibbs (cinemattraction), Andy Klein (LA CityBeat), J Robert Parks (Daily Plastic) and Joshua Rothkopf (Time Out New York).

James Hannaham talks with Lee for Salon.

Updates, 9/27: "At two hours and 40 minutes, Miracle is as empty and hollow an 'epic' as they come." Michael Joshua Rowin for Stop Smiling.

"Spike Lee's Miracle at St Anna is an ambitious sprawl, a picture that's dramatically compelling in some places and plodding and didactic in others," writes Salon's Stephanie Zacharek. "It's also occasionally moving, even when it bends too close to sentimentality. Watching it, I got the sense that Lee had simply decided to pull out all the stops, to sink himself into one hell of a story - part World War II drama, part mystery, part meditation on what it means to fight for a country that might not give a damn about you - and see where it might lead him. Unfortunately, it leads him in circles. And yet there's enough vitality here to keep the picture going, even through the rough patches."

James Rocchi talks with Lee for Cinematical.

Posted by dwhudson at September 22, 2008 1:49 AM