As a director, Lee continues to hone his considerable craft and is unafraid to take creative risks along the way.

| May 3, 2019

| Original Score: B+ | Sep 7, 2011

Lacking the moral indignation and militant politics of Lee's former work, this vibrantly colorful father-son melodrama is soft at the center, but it's one of the most accessible films Lee has made and Denzel Washington is terrific.

Full Review | Original Score: B | Mar 25, 2008

At the end of Mr. Lee's movie, all you feel is the distraction of Mr. Lee's stylistic exhibitionism, without which, I concede, he might not be regarded as a genius in some quarters.

| Apr 27, 2007

[Lee] gets a charming performance from Allen, who, in his acting debut, occupies his pedestal with grace and diffidence.

Full Review | Mar 25, 2007

As usual, Lee tries many kinds of stylistic effects and uses wall-to-wall music (by Aaron Copland and Public Enemy); what's different this time is how personally driven the story feels.

| Mar 25, 2007

Most scenes play too long, with a surplus of ideas, textures, tones and characters, and after 134 minutes it's clear Lee's problem with closure hasn't gone away.

| Feb 9, 2006

Washington's Jake Shuttlesworth looks tough and hard, an odd but refreshing turn for an actor long associated with handsomely heroic roles.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jun 18, 2002

A two-hour air ball.

| Original Score: 2/4 | Apr 12, 2002

Washington is so consistently effective an actor that it hardly needs be said that his excellent performance as the beleaguered Jake carries the film.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Feb 14, 2001

Milwaukee Bucks guard Ray Allen delivers nothing less than the best performance ever put on film by a pro athlete.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/4 | Jan 1, 2000

He Got Game is Lee's best film since Malcolm X.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Jan 1, 2000

After a couple of seriously worrying missteps, Lee is back at the top of his game, positioning himself as one of the best American filmmakers of his day.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Jan 1, 2000

Lee may never have the narrow focus to sustain a film on storytelling alone, and he may never need it. What he has here is an explosion of spectacular gambits and a great high-concept hook.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Jan 1, 2000

Lee is a long way from the size and scope of his best film, Do the Right Thing, but at least he is working on a subject he cares about and is doing it with polish.

Full Review | Jan 1, 2000

Sometimes brilliantly on target, sometimes way off, but never afraid to take the big shots that safer, more risk-averse filmmakers pass off when the artistic stakes are high.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Jan 1, 2000

He Got Game is a little too sappy to be a great movie, but it puts the ball in the hole.

| Jan 1, 2000

The wildly uneven script includes both disciplined, lively riffs and amateurishly artificial exchanges.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/4 | Jan 1, 2000

The year's first Hollywood movie to burst with palpable feeling.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/4 | Jan 1, 2000

The movie is a volatile combination of ambitious mythmaking and nasty reality, and like most of Spike Lee's work, it is also an inextricable combination of good and bad.

Full Review | Jan 1, 2000