Spike Lee’s Miracle at St. Anna opens today, Friday, here in the US. Roger Ebert’s review is here via the Chicago Sun-Times. Ebert argues that Lee’s statue as an artist led to the inclusion of scenes that probably should have been omitted for clarity. Yet at the end, he says this:
And “Miracle at St. Anna” contains richness, anger, history, sentiment, fantasy, reality, violence and life. Maybe too much. Better than too little.
The review also discusses one memorable battle scene, and based on this alone, it sounds like a “must see.”
“Miracle at St. Anna” has one of the best battle scenes I can remember, on a par with “Saving Private Ryan” but more tightly focused in a specific situation rather than encompassing a huge panorama.
So there you have it. A respected critic says M@SA has flaws but is worth the price of admission. Others are not so kind. Check this from the Washington Post by Ann Hornaday.
Man…tough crowd.
Overwrought, overproduced, overbusy and overlong, “Miracle at St. Anna” finally suffers from the most grievous filmmaking sin of all: the failure of trust, in the story and the audience. And no miracle can overcome that.
I’m hopefully going to see it sometime in the next few days and write about it here. Stay tuned.
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