MOVIE REVIEW: Shaft (2019)
(Only One Spider-Man - Daniel Pemberton)
Store-bought cake mix is a hell of a thing when you stop and think about it.
Recipes for wonderful things like cake are a mountain of variables that all have to be within a particular tolerance, or you don't end up with what you're after. Most people don't give that a lot of thought, nor do they consider how remarkable an achievement cake mix actually is.
There's the recipe itself to consider. Are you using the right ingredients, in the right amount? Are you mixing properly and applying temperature as you should? Then there's the ingredients themselves. Everyone knows that if you use higher quality ingredients, the end result will reflect that.
Movies aren't really much different than cake when you stop and think about it, and Shaft is no exception to this rule. They are made, or broken, based on a recipe, ingredients, and preparation.
The last time Shaft made an appearance, the creators knew exactly what they were doing, and the movie was very well done as a result. Have they been able to follow the recipe again?
THE SHORT VERSION:
Afraid not, no.
THE LONG VERSION:
In a very real way, a good movie isn't complicated. It's not easy to do, but it's certainly not complicated. Take 2000's 'reboot' of Shaft, for example. It was a great movie, and a wonderful way to pass the torch from Richard Roundtree to Samuel L. Jackson. Making Shaft work was an easy recipe:
- You need the main character, of course. Richard Roundtree oozed cool from every pore, was smart, saavy, smooth, and very capable of putting boot to ass in a meaningful fashion when required. And he never, ever let you down.
- You need a story that serves the main character without compromising them.
- You need a world that plays well with that character, from setting to wardrobe to music.
They nailed it in 2000, but they sort of blew it 19 years later.
The spoilers, they do follow.
2019's Shaft follows young John Shaft Junior (JJ), long removed from his father, Samuel L. Jackson's John Shaft from the 2000 film. He gets into a spot and needs help solving a crime. Enter Shaft Sr, who we shall call Shaft from here on out. Together, they solve the mystery, bond, and get the girl. This doesn't sound like a horrible story, but as is frequently the case, the devil is in the details. Here are several of the ways that 2019's Shaft just plain gets it wrong:
- John Shaft might take you down, but he'll never let you down. He's a good guy. He stands up. He does what's right, and he does it while looking smooth, in control, and like the bad mutha that he is. Except in this movie, he's revealed not only to be a deeply flawed individual, but in ways that, in my opinion, aren't consistent with the rock solid Shaft that we all know and aspire to.
- There's lots of Shaft being made out to be a dead-beat dad in this film, but Shaft exits his son's life for a good reason, and that's never really held up. More than that, it's Maya, JJ's mom, that demands this exit, not Shaft himself. However responsible that demand may or may not have been, Shaft is made to take the whole blame for not being in JJ's life.
- The manner in which Shaft interfaces with JJ as he grows up is completely inconsistent with the smooth, soul-filled gentleman Shaft that we see in previous movies. If Shaft were to continue interfacing with his son, it would have been in a far classier way.
- Shaft gives JJ a -LOT- of stick for the way he dresses, the career he's chosen, and for the life, the relatively good life, that he's chosen to lead, and he does all of this with two huge scoops of racial profiling. Also not Shaft.
This movie has plenty going for it, and it's an amusing watch at certain points, but it's very much a rental. Worse, it sort of demonizes the character of Shaft, which is a stupid move to make with a franchise. There are lots of very unShaft-like messages that get sent with this movie. Someone had the bright idea to try and make several statements with this film, most of them stupid ones, instead of simply letting Shaft do his thing.
That was a mistake. And the cake that resulted was worse than bad. It was disappointing.
Store-bought cake mix is a hell of a thing when you stop and think about it.
Recipes for wonderful things like cake are a mountain of variables that all have to be within a particular tolerance, or you don't end up with what you're after. Most people don't give that a lot of thought, nor do they consider how remarkable an achievement cake mix actually is.
There's the recipe itself to consider. Are you using the right ingredients, in the right amount? Are you mixing properly and applying temperature as you should? Then there's the ingredients themselves. Everyone knows that if you use higher quality ingredients, the end result will reflect that.
Movies aren't really much different than cake when you stop and think about it, and Shaft is no exception to this rule. They are made, or broken, based on a recipe, ingredients, and preparation.
The last time Shaft made an appearance, the creators knew exactly what they were doing, and the movie was very well done as a result. Have they been able to follow the recipe again?
THE SHORT VERSION:
Afraid not, no.
THE LONG VERSION:
In a very real way, a good movie isn't complicated. It's not easy to do, but it's certainly not complicated. Take 2000's 'reboot' of Shaft, for example. It was a great movie, and a wonderful way to pass the torch from Richard Roundtree to Samuel L. Jackson. Making Shaft work was an easy recipe:
- You need the main character, of course. Richard Roundtree oozed cool from every pore, was smart, saavy, smooth, and very capable of putting boot to ass in a meaningful fashion when required. And he never, ever let you down.
- You need a story that serves the main character without compromising them.
- You need a world that plays well with that character, from setting to wardrobe to music.
They nailed it in 2000, but they sort of blew it 19 years later.
The spoilers, they do follow.
2019's Shaft follows young John Shaft Junior (JJ), long removed from his father, Samuel L. Jackson's John Shaft from the 2000 film. He gets into a spot and needs help solving a crime. Enter Shaft Sr, who we shall call Shaft from here on out. Together, they solve the mystery, bond, and get the girl. This doesn't sound like a horrible story, but as is frequently the case, the devil is in the details. Here are several of the ways that 2019's Shaft just plain gets it wrong:
- John Shaft might take you down, but he'll never let you down. He's a good guy. He stands up. He does what's right, and he does it while looking smooth, in control, and like the bad mutha that he is. Except in this movie, he's revealed not only to be a deeply flawed individual, but in ways that, in my opinion, aren't consistent with the rock solid Shaft that we all know and aspire to.
- There's lots of Shaft being made out to be a dead-beat dad in this film, but Shaft exits his son's life for a good reason, and that's never really held up. More than that, it's Maya, JJ's mom, that demands this exit, not Shaft himself. However responsible that demand may or may not have been, Shaft is made to take the whole blame for not being in JJ's life.
- The manner in which Shaft interfaces with JJ as he grows up is completely inconsistent with the smooth, soul-filled gentleman Shaft that we see in previous movies. If Shaft were to continue interfacing with his son, it would have been in a far classier way.
- Shaft gives JJ a -LOT- of stick for the way he dresses, the career he's chosen, and for the life, the relatively good life, that he's chosen to lead, and he does all of this with two huge scoops of racial profiling. Also not Shaft.
This movie has plenty going for it, and it's an amusing watch at certain points, but it's very much a rental. Worse, it sort of demonizes the character of Shaft, which is a stupid move to make with a franchise. There are lots of very unShaft-like messages that get sent with this movie. Someone had the bright idea to try and make several statements with this film, most of them stupid ones, instead of simply letting Shaft do his thing.
That was a mistake. And the cake that resulted was worse than bad. It was disappointing.
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