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"He Got Game" Movie Review

"Game': No score

G. Allen Johnson

Spike Lee, Denzel Washington team for hoops tale

When he's on, Spike Lee is one of the best chroniclers of not just the African American experience, but the American experience.

Few commercial filmmakers explore the political and social implications of race and urban problems as consistently as Lee.

That's why "He Got Game" is such a disappointment. Unfocused, but loaded with potential, it feels like a work in which Lee struggled to dovetail his unique place in the worlds of basketball and celebrity with his skeptical social conscience.

Denzel Washington stars as Jake Shuttlesworth, in federal prison for killing his wife. As it's signing week for high school seniors, and Jake's estranged son, Jesus Shuttlesworth, is the nation's No. 1 recruit, the warden (Ned Beatty) releases Jake for one week to convince Jesus to choose the governor's alma mater.

(Why not just have Jake released on parole and re-enter his son's life at a particularly difficult time?)

Naturally, Jesus (played by Milwaukee Bucks star Ray Allen), said to be college basketball's "second coming," is feeling the pressure of agents, recruiters and even his own extended family and girlfriend. Now his father, whom he hates, pops up. It's going to take a lot for him to forgive Jake for what happened to his mother.

Illegal college basketball recruiting is a meaty, compelling subject, filled with ethical and educational implications that reach beyond sport. But like his hero, a young man faced with impossibly complex distractions, Lee allows his movie to get bogged down in a mess of tabloid-like incidents.

The film initially promises to explore the troubled relationship of a father and son, set against the system of big-time athletics, which can exploit underprivileged young men. With Washington - who's great in this film - it should have been a slam dunk.

Instead, the film degenerates into a fake, cartoon-like atmosphere. Ironically, the real-life stars from basketball and TV who play themselves - Michael Jordan, Reggie Miller, John Thompson and Dick Vitale are examples - only add to the unbelievability. So do the "celebrity cameos" - Jim Brown as a federal agent, John Turturro as a college basketball coach.

Only Los Angles Lakers star Rick Fox is any good - he almost steals the picture in a brief, hilarious role as a college athlete trying to help recruit Jesus to his school.

Jesus (the film's constant stream of biblical jokes and references wears thin real fast) is tempted in many ways: by shady recruiters, women who want to sleep with him, wads of cash, an uncle who buys a car based on his marketability, and a girlfriend who cheats on him to assist a slimy sports agent who's trying to get him to turn pro.

Lee spends so much time with these distractions that Washington - one of our finest actors - is barely in half the movie. And much of his screen time is taken up with a completely unnecessary subplot in which Jake befriends a white prostitute (Milla Jovovich).

The father-son story becomes almost an afterthought - in fact, Jesus' young sister (Zelda Harris), who still likes Jake and is being raised by Jesus - disappears for good before the film's half over.

The ethical dilemmas, far from appearing morally troubling, are instead presented as good fun. During a recruiting trip at "Tech U," Jesus is seduced by two women students, leading to a sex scene so graphic Lee cast two real-life porn stars.

All this would be more effective if Allen was a good actor. He's likable, but so much depends on facial reactions that a professional actor would have been better (a relatively blank befuddlement is Allen's way of expressing someone at a moral crossroads). Casting a real-life basketball player is especially unnecessary when there are precious few basketball scenes in the movie.

"He Got Game" is such a let-down, especially in light of Lee's recent work. "Crooklyn," a sweet family film, is one the decade's most underrated character dramas. And "Clockers" deserved major Oscar consideration. Then Lee took a chance, using a Super-16 camera and minuscule budget to make his Million Man March movie, "Get on the Bus."

With Washington, star of Lee's "Malcolm X" and "Mo Better Blues" , "He Got Game" should have been a worthy addition to that canon. It isn't.