Clockers . Tucson Weekly . 09-21-95

Clockers

DIRECTED BY: Spike Lee

REVIEWED: 09-21-95

Spike Lee's adaptation of Richard Price's intricate novel follows a young park-bench drug dealer (Mekhi Phifer) who may or may not have been the gunman in a murder. In spite of his overemphasis on style, Lee successfully juggles a number of characters whose lives affect each others' like chess pieces in a microcosmic Brooklyn neighborhood, including the wire-pulling dealer who runs the show (Delroy Lindo) and a friendly homicide cop played (very engagingly) by Harvey Keitel. Because the story is more a societal character study than a mystery, don't expect the oomph of Do the Right Thing; the film deals in texture and dialogue, not bright action. And while it's a cut above most other movies in drug-related black cinema, unfortunately the content doesn't reach much deeper.

--Zachary Woodruff

Other Films by Spike Lee
Four Little Girls
Get On the Bus
Girl 6
He Got Game
Summer of Sam

Film Vault Suggested Links
Playing God
The Limey
Mean Streets

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