Critical Response to Do the Right Thing

Critical Response: Do the Right Thing
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Critical Response: Do The Right Thing
The 1989 Universal Picture’s film Do the Right Thing directed by Spike Lee presents a unique perception of the social issues of race and ethnicity in the American community. The movie builds around a certain block or black neighborhood, which is characterized by people from all walks of life. The director casts himself in the film with more attention on the interactions between Sal, one of the primary characters, his sons, Mookie, and other characters posing as customers to the Sal’s Pizza Parlor. The opening scenes of the movie showcase Sal’s arrival with his two sons to open up the business after which the pizza delivery boy Mookie shows up for work CITATION Spi89 \l 1033 (Lee, 1989). Sal has a special relationship with both Mookie and the entire neighborhood courtesy of his pizza business, both of which thrive on the strictly business ideology. The weaker ties existing between the Italian entrepreneur and his black neighborhood come to hurt his business as the underlying racial tensions between the two parties come alive in the unfolding events. The director takes the audience through the existence and development of racial tension in the African American neighborhood by focusing on the different interactions and integration among the cast as the movie unfolds.
The peaceful coexistence between Sal and the entire neighborhood comes to a stop following a heated argument with Buggin Out and Radio Raheem about putting up posters of African Americans on the walls of the parlor as the owner had done for his Italian counterparts CITATION Spi89 \l 1033 (Lee, 1989). It is during the heated debate that Sal loses his temper and unleashes his racial prejudice against the black ...