Introducing: Un-lee-shed

In the tradition of last year's bi-monthly series Re-coen-sidering, here comes Un-lee-shed.

I have always thought of myself as a big Spike Lee fan, which made it all the more gratifying that he really returned to form with last year's BlacKkKlansman, my #2 of the year.

However, thinking a little bit extra about Lee last year made me question my own Lee credentials.

I call myself a big Lee fan, but you know what? I haven't seen anywhere close to his whole filmography. In fact, even if I devote a bi-monthly series to watching his features I haven't seen, I'll still have a couple left to tackle when the series is over.

Better get started.

So every two months in 2019, starting in February and ending in December, I'll watch one Lee film I have not previously seen, and post about it here. I'll go chronologically, unless I run into sourcing issues. This is the tentative list, pending availability of course:

She's Gotta Have It (1986)
School Daze (1988)
Get on the Bus (1996)
4 Little Girls (1997)
Miracle at St. Anna (2008)
Chi-Raq (2015)

That would still leave Mo' Better Blues (1990), Clockers (1995) and Girl 6 (1996) (my goodness was Lee prolific in the 1990s) as remaining unseen, and serving as good alternatives should I have trouble sourcing any of these.

You might argue that one of the above three titles is more significant in Lee's filmography than Miracle at St. Anna, but I'd like to spread things out chronologically as much as I can, and my coverage of 21st century Lee films is actually pretty good. Besides, I'm as curious about Lee's misguided attempts, of which there have been many, as I am about the times that his instincts are true. And I don't want to take others' word about which constitutes which. I saw Bamboozled about five years ago expecting to dislike it based on others' assessments of its merits, but I ended up loving it.

Not a lot more to say except I'm going to go track down She's Gotta Have It.

One final note that I hope goes without saying. I'm including hyphens in the name of this series in order to draw attention to my own cleverness, but this is not meant to be pronounced as a three syllable word ending in "shed." It's just "unleashed." Don't forget it. There will be a quiz later.

See you back here next month.