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"He Got Game" Movie Review

Spike Lee scores magnificently in basketball saga He Got Game

By Roger Moore, Journal Arts Reporter

With He Got Game, Spike Lee tries to do for basketball what Field of Dreams did for baseball. In a thrilling opening sequence, underscored with Aaron Copland's Fanfare for the Common Man, Lee shows boys and girls shooting hoops all over America, from the playgrounds of New York to the barnyards of Iowa.

In brilliant montages Lee sets up the atmosphere surrounding a sought-after basketball recruit in the days leading up to his signing with a college.

And in quick strokes, Lee sets up his story, a father-and-son reunion with basketball as its backdrop. He combines superb actors, terrific music (by Copland and the thunderous rap group Public Enemy) and a compelling morality tale to create a film that at times approaches magnificence.

Ray Allen, a star with the NBA's Milwaukee Bucks, plays Jesus Shuttlesworth, a young man with a stellar grade-point average, amazing work ethic, a strong moral foundation and the most amazing basketball skills that those recruiting him have ever seen. Dozens of coaches, sportscasters and fellow players tell ESPN (in a clever mock-documentary in the middle of the film) that ''he got game.'' This Jesus promises, to the coach who can land him, to be basketball's version of the Second Coming.

Jesus is forever being reminded that the next decision he makes will be the most important of his life. Coaches (including Dean Smith, as himself) sit down with him and repeat that mantra. One (John Turturro, doing a Rick Pitino impersonation) is named Billy Sunday and preaches to Jesus what he should do.

And everybody wants to know where Jesus has decided to go. His high-school coach (Arthur J. Nascarella) tempts him with cash to be let in on the secret.

Jesus' girlfriend, Lala (Rosario Dawson), wants him to meet with an agent friend of hers so that he can turn pro.

Jesus was raised by an aunt and uncle (Michelle Shay and Bill Nunn), and the uncle seizes the chance to cash in on his celebrity.

The young man's home life is strange, because he lost his mother when he was little and his father has been in prison.

That situation creates the last piece of pressure that Jesus faces. Dad (Denzel Washington) is let out on parole so that he can talk his boy into attending the governor's alma mater, Big State U.

The film follows two stories. Jesus faces the temptations that his game presents to him. His hated father, Jake, wants to both do right by his son and get himself out of jail. In flashbacks, we see the father driving his son to excel at basketball. We also see the roots of the son's hatred for his father.

Ray visits colleges, fends off reporters and ruminates over his decision. Jake fends off parole officers (including one played by Jim Brown) and falls for a prostitute (Milla Jovovich), in one of the few distractions from the main plot.

Will Jake put his own needs aside for the good of a son who refuses to listen to him? Is Jesus the straight arrow he seems to be? Will he see through the temptresses who hope to talk him into doing what they want him to do?

In Lee's film, basketball is a form of redemption. That's a lot of baggage for such a slight story to carry. He Got Game never quite reaches the epic status that Lee aspires to for the film. The themes, characterizations and approach to the material are dead on. But the subject is too flimsy to support the big theme that Lee saddles it with. And Lee's penchant for jarring, comically crude sex scenes undercuts his most passionate film since Malcolm X.

Still, He Got Game is proof positive that Lee, after several missteps, is still a formidable storyteller and filmmaker. He Got Game shows us Spike at the top of his.