On Tuesday, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel fired the head of the Chicago police department, Garry F. McCarthy. Spike Lee‘s much-discussed next joint, “Chi-Raq”, will be released this Friday, December 4, courtesy of Amazon Studios – their first in-house feature film, in a deal that involves both Roadside Attractions and Lionsgate (noteworthy, as both have previously teamed up on prestige film fare).
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Neither Lee nor his prominent ensemble of cast members made any qualms about the movie’s theme and its target audience.
Spike Lee’s “Chi-Raq” is likely to make a lot of people angry – not for what it says about Chicago’s homicide statistics, especially among young African-Americans, but for how it says it.
Emanuel won a second term earlier this year.
“Chi-Raq” is a modern day adaptation of the ancient Greek play “Lysistrata” by Aristophanes.
The march from Broadway to Times Square was to show solidarity with Chicago, which has been racked by protests over the fatal police shooting of 17-year-old Laquan McDonald in October 2014.
The Rev. Al Sharpton walked the movie’s orange carpet before the premiere, and later he headed the “Orange March”, a show of support to help ending gun violence.
“I think that 2,200 people being shot per year, and 500 murders (in Chicago)…it’s very tragic that information was suppressed for an election cycle”, Cusack said.
“We’ve got to get out here and express our pain the right way”, he said.
John Cusack portrays a thinly veiled version of Father Michael Pfleger of St. Sabina Church, who rails against America’s love affair with firearms and offers a reward for the killer of the latest murdered child.
“I take responsibility and none of us are above it”, Emanuel said Tuesday.
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Lee even wore orange-framed glasses. They’re wary of any movie that treats these subjects as a source of any sort of satire, dark or light, purposeful or frivolous. The film explores ways to stop the bloodshed on city streets.
