“Fact is, all lies, all evil deeds, they stink. You can cover them up for a while, but they don’t go away,” says the charismatic robber Dalton Russell in Spike Lee’s enthralling and fast-paced heist movie “Inside Man” (2006). This was Lee’s biggest box office success to date, and when I first saw it I enjoyed it very much. Yet I didn’t play close attention to it for I thought it was just a paycheck job – a commercial studio film – for one of our greatest filmmakers who has been making provocative independent cinema about the Black experience since 1986’s “She’s Gotta Have it.” Well, shame on me. Upon a second viewing on Saturday night, the film is still the thrilling edge of your seat cat and mouse I remember – but the layers of social commentary and politics and visual potency – are a revelation. Earlier this Summer we got a chance to see the so far best movie of 2020 in his masterful and timely “Da 5 Bloods” – in which four African American vets confront the evil in our past while on an adventure finding buried gold in Vietnam. “Inside Man” plays out like an urgent companion to this work – a mining of our racist history disguised as an exuberant bank robbery and hostage situation – intentionally recalling “Dog Day Afternoon.” “Things are not what they appear,” says detective Frazier (played by a terrific Denzel Washington). Oh, yes indeed. Things are not what they appear…
“Pay strict attention to what I say because I choose my words carefully, and I never repeat myself,” exhorts Dalton Russell (a cunning Clive Owen) – looking directly into your eyes – at the top of the story. He’s inside a cell – narrating – and giving you the rules of engagement. He’s the mastermind behind the attack of a Manhattan bank. Led by him, robbers masked and dressed in jumpsuits looking like painters burst into the lobby of the branch – using variants of the name “Steve” as aliases – lock the doors and make all the employees and clients hostages. They make everyone strip and change into jumpsuits and masks so they all look like the assailants. They keep rotating them amongst the different rooms – sometimes inserting themselves as hostages. Imagine those sleight of hand card games you see on street corners. In the meantime, the Police surround the bank, and Detectives Frazier and Bill Mitchel (the ever reliable Chiwetel Ejiofor) – who have a unfortunate reputation in hostage situations – show up to the scene. To complicate things even further the chairman of the board of directors and founder of the bank, Arthur Case (played by a devilish debonair Christopher Plummer) learns of the robbery taking place, he hires “fixer” Madeleine White (a deliciously wily Jodie Foster) to protect the contents of his safe. Nothing is what it seems.
Spike Lee knows cinema and loves cinema. He has studied the greats and incorporates it all into his vision. He grabs Sidney Lumet’s 1975 masterpiece and turns inside out. Where in that film you had an inexperienced out of control robber in Sonny – you have the antithesis in Dalton. Working with one of the most exciting cinematograpers in cinema – Matthew Libatique (“Black Swan”) – Lee sets up a visual vocabulary. Notice how fluid and controlled the camera work is when you’re watching the robbers take over the bank. It’s balletic. When the police and the detectives arrive the camera becomes shaky – even the editing becomes chaotic. There is usage of cross-cutting and flashforwards to scenes with the hostages being interrogated by the police. These are shot austerely and desaturated of color. Throughout the movie there are throwaway (no such thing in a Spike Lee Joint!) scenes with different ethnic groups dealing with the police in New York. Watch for Ms. White’s arrival into the bank – how the camera shoots her from up above (bird’s eye) and slowly travels down – and completely changes our visual perspective. The camera movement is very suggestive and symbolic. There’s also an extraordinary animated sequence – a video game that an eight year old is playing in the style of “Grand Theft Auto” that becomes an indictment of violence. Remember, things are not what they appear.
Spike Lee exposes that a crime has been committed. After all the razzle and dazzle and the entertainment is over – you are left to ponder who the guilty party truly is. One of the greatest things about Spike Lee is that as he’s gotten older he’s gotten better.
Detective Frazier: “This ain’t no bank robbery.”
Love,
Roger
Available to stream on Netflix and DIRECTV and to rent on YouTube, iTunes, Google Play, Vudu, FandangoNOW, Redbox, Microsoft, Amazon Prime and AMC Theatres on Demand.
Written by Russell Gewirtz
Directed by Spike Lee
Starring Denzel Washington, Clive Owen, Jodie Foster, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Christopher Plummer, and Willem Dafoe
129 minutes
Writing “Inside Man”
“Russell Gewirtz wrote a fresh, intriguing take on the genre of the bank robbery heist, and I liked the script and really wanted to do it. “Dog Day Afternoon” is one of my favorite films, and this story was a contemporary take on that kind of Movie.” said Lee. Grazer recognized that with “Inside Man,” the time had finally come for the long discussed collaboration with Lee. Grazer recalls, “When we met this time, Spike said, ‘We’ve had meetings and false starts, but I promise you we’re going to have a great finish.’ He looked me straight in the eye, grabbed my arm and said, ‘Let’s do it.’” Grazer was as excited about the script as he was about working with Lee. “For me, originality is the thing,” he explains. “A script has to make me feel curious, and at no point can I feel complacent. In this story, it was the red herring aspect that I liked – not knowing why things were happening and later having everything revealed in such a satisfying and surprising way. These twists and turns really took the model of a heist film in a new and interesting direction.” Grazer and Lee’s first-time partnership wasn’t the film’s only new collaboration. For a project to unite such an award-winning, accomplished assembly of cast and filmmakers, one might assume the crafty screenplay had come from a veteran screenwriter. But Russell Gewirtz holds the rare distinction of seeing his first original screenplay produced, directed and performed by some of the most distinguished talents in the business.
After dabbling in several careers, Gewirtz spent several years living in Europe and South America, where he says the idea for “Inside Man” gelled. “I had some version of this story in my head for five or six years, and then crucial elements started coming together. I bounced the pitch off my good friend Daniel Rosenberg [later the film’s executive producer].” After over a year of work on Gewirtz’s script, Rosenberg shopped the finished version to a handful of the top Los Angeles agencies. One of those agents sent it to Imagine, and the rest is Hollywood history. Reflecting on the process, the writer notes, “To say that I’ve been spoiled by this would be an understatement. It was surreal to come to the first table reading and sit down to Denzel, Clive, Jodie and Christopher delivering lines that I wrote. Then we begin filming, and I watch Spike orchestrate the entire production.” Not only was Gewirtz impressed by the all-stars bringing his words to film, he was amazed at the production value of the “Inside Man” set. “The team imagined and constructed an entire bank based on a few lines I put to paper four years ago. Unbelievable.” (web.archive.org)
The Making of “Inside Man”
“Principal photography for “Inside Man” took place entirely on location in New York City and ran nearly two months between June and August of 2005. Veteran production designer Wynn Thomas led the design team in creating sets for the film. His collaborations with Lee date back 20 years, all the way to Lee’s breakthrough independent feature film, “She’s Gotta Have It.” Those years have gone a long way to building a trusting partnership with little reason for detailed explanations. “We’re so comfortable, we’re like an old married couple,” says Thomas of his ongoing working relationship with Lee. “We talk for about five minutes at the beginning of the film, and I don’t have to talk to him again for the rest of the picture. He knows he can trust me to give him what he wants.” One example is the set Thomas designed for Detective Keith Frazier’s apartment, which he describes as very masculine and rich and highly monochromatic in its many hues of brown. “It’s chocolate on chocolate on chocolate, “ says Thomas, “and it was my instinctual response to his living space. When Spike saw it, he said it looked like a Blue Note album cover, with all those similar tonalities.”
Thomas and his team got to work designing interior sets for a wide variety of locations—such as the NYPD headquarters, the MCC, an interrogation room, the bank’s basement (where the hostages are eventually held) and Frazier’s apartment. Scouting had zeroed in on the perfect stand-in for Branch Number 32 of Manhattan Trust—the bank’s main set was located in a former Wall Street bank that had been closed and later repurposed as a cigar bar. Thomas and his team were responsible for a major undertaking, charged with restoring the former bank to its 1920s grandeur and architectural integrity. “This movie takes place in the world of old New York money,” Thomas explains, “so we had to do extensive renovations to make the first floor look like an old-fashioned institution of money and power—it’s where the robbers first hold their hostages.” Says Lee, “We were sweating at first, because the bank set was one of the last ones we found—and it was the most important. Without a bank, we didn’t have a movie. But everything ended up going very smoothly. We shot in the heart of Wall Street in a bank that had been closed down. It was like having a back lot in the middle of Wall Street.” Office space for Christopher Plummer’s character, Arthur Case, was also located in an older building—one that formerly housed customs offices. Plummer notes, “It’s just the sort of office that J. Pierpont Morgan or Andrew Carnegie would have had. It’s just something extraordinary. The space literally presents Case’s power, so I found that part of my character was to simply play very cool about everything. You don’t have to push the power, because it’s all around you.”
“Inside Man” was the second production to shoot at the newly established Steiner Studios in Brooklyn, New York. The 15-acre facility at the historic Brooklyn Navy Yard is the largest production facility east of Los Angeles, newly built from the ground up. Its massive size allowed for all of the interior sets to be housed in one place. Economy of shooting was something that Lee very much took to heart.Commenting on Lee’s commitment and focus, producer Grazer observes, “He’s very economic and wouldn’t even eat lunch. He’d just stand in the street and plan his next Shot.” Lee attributes his work ethic to his parents, most especially his mother, who has since passed away. Lee closes, “My mother was an art teacher and my father is a jazz musician, and they instilled in their children a strong foundation. My mother said, ‘Never be satisfied. Do your best, but keep striving onward and upward.’ I try and bring that to every movie I make.” (web.archive.org)
Composer Terence Blanchard on “Inside Man”
“…We were scoring “Inside Man” when the hurricane hit…One of the things we always talk about is, “What haven’t we done yet? What sounds haven’t we used yet?” The interesting thing about Spike is that he has a lot of trust in his composer. First of all, he doesn’t want any mock-ups. That ain’t his thing at all. He always says, “Just give it to me on the piano.” Now, for a composer, that’s a scary thing. You’re always trying to indicate tone with the mockups. But to his credit, he’s hearing the raw melodic material. He says, “OK, I want to use this and this.” [turns to Lee] I don’t know if I’ve ever told you, this but you remember when I gave you the themes for “Inside Man”?…I gave you one theme where I was trying to hint so hard, like, let me put a flute on this piano to make sure he knows that I want it to be the love theme. And you said, “That should be the main theme!” I went, “OK, I need to make this next song menacing and huge.” It’s a great exercise in terms of how you have to adapt and change. But the other thing you should know about Spike is that once we kind of settle on the thematic material, he doesn’t want to hear anything until we get to the stage, until we get to the studio, until we record the orchestra. That’s rare. I think for him, he wants to hear it the way the audience will hear it for the first time, with real musicians putting their hearts and souls into it, because it does make a difference. I know guys who put all their time into making mockups, but that still doesn’t really indicate what happens when you have people in the room playing and being inspired by other people. One of the things I love about what we do is that, in the midst of us recording the music, there’s always exploration.” (indiewire.com)
About Director Spike Lee
“Spike Lee’s iconic body of storytelling has made an indelible mark on filmmaking and television. Most recently, he Directed and Co-wrote the Academy Award® – nominated and critically acclaimed hit film BlacKkKlansman, winning the Oscar® for Best Adapted Screenplay. His career spans over 30 years and includes: “She’s Gotta Have It,” “School Daze,” “Do the Right Thing,” “Mo’ Better Blues,” “Jungle Fever,” “Malcolm X,” “Crooklyn,” “Clockers,” “Girl 6,” “Get on the Bus,” “He Got Game,” “Summer of Sam,” “Bamboozled,” “25th Hour,” “She Hate Me,” “Inside Man,” “Miracle at St. Anna,” “Red Hook Summer,” “Old Boy,” and “Chi-Raq.” Lee’s outstanding feature documentary work includes the double Emmy® Award-winning “If God Is Willing” and “Da Creek Don’t Rise,” a follow up to his HBO documentary film “When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts” and the Peabody Award-winning “A Huey P Newton Story.” In the Television area, he launched his Netflix original series “She’s Gotta Have It,” which ran 2 seasons on the platform. The series is a contemporary update of his classic film. Lee is also known for his legendary Air Jordan TV commercials and marketing campaigns with Michael Jordan for Nike. In 1997 he launched the advertising agency Spike DDB, a fully integrated agency with a focus on trendsetter, cross-cultural and millennial audiences. He recently Directed new additions to the Capital One “Road Trip” national campaign featuring Samuel L. Jackson and Charles Barkley. In addition to his films, TV series and commercials, Lee has directed a number of music videos and shorts for artists such as Michael Jackson, Prince, Public Enemy, Branford Marsalis, Bruce Hornsby, Miles Davis and Anita Baker. Spike Lee is a five-time Oscar nominee for his work on “BlacKkKlansman,” “Do The Right Thing” and “4 Little Girls.” He was awarded an Honorary Oscar in 2015 for his lifetime achievement and contributions to the state of motion picture arts and sciences. In 2019, he won his first Oscar with “BlacKkKlansman” for Best Adapted Screenplay. He is a graduate of Morehouse College and New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, where he is a tenured Professor of Film and Artistic Director. Lee’s Production Company 40 Acres and a Mule Filmworks is based in Da Republic of Brooklyn, NY.” (focusfeatures.com) Lee’s latest film, “Da 5 Bloods” was released in June of 2020 and is currently available to stream on Netflix.