Every Spike Lee Movie Ranked Worst To Best

The best thing about Red Hook Summer is its world-building. Returning to his roots of low-budget, slice-of-life drama set in Brooklyn, the film finds Lee making the neighbourhood of Red Hook a compelling assessment of community spirit and hope.

That being said, the rest of the coming-of-age flick is never able to live up to Lee's masterful setting control. It features a slew of would-be remarkable characters, none of whom get the right amount of time to develop into sympathetic figures, and its misguided plot twist derails the whole story and leaves it with nowhere to go.

There's a simple, deeply affecting tale in here somewhere, but Lee tries too hard and does too much, and ends up squandering its potential.