Lee doesn't manage to thread the diverse anecdotes into a cohesive narrative. [Full review in Spanish]

| Sep 6, 2022

Spike Lee exhausts his bag of tricks, trying to keep the energy level up, and parts of the movie are affecting or exciting. But after a while you grow weary of being pelted with the director’s pyrotechnics.

| Original Score: C- | Sep 2, 2022

Never quite pays off, with stilted dialoguing plaguing otherwise fine performances from Mira Sorvino and John Leguizamo.

| Original Score: 1/5 | Aug 10, 2020

...it was such an unexpected, marginal tale.

| Jun 21, 2019

...a scorching melodrama about childhood friends-played by John Leguizamo and Adrien Brody-whose relationship reaches an emotional boiling point.

| Mar 25, 2019

One of Spike Lee's most dynamic pictures, so electric and overflowing with energy it's damn near exhausting.

| Jul 11, 2018

Summer of Sam, for all its flash and well-crafted fury, is only superficially disturbing. It's a nightmare stroll down memory lane: feel-bad nostalgia.

| Mar 2, 2018

A deliberately overblown MEAN STREETS parody

| Jun 30, 2016

This ultimately disappoints, but it is good to see Lee branch out into subjects which don't immediately lend themselves to his single-minded politicizing.

| Sep 23, 2008

Like most of Lee's work, this bites off more than it can chew, but the breadth and energy are impressive.

| Sep 23, 2008

The film is sloppy and ill-formed, its tone lurching drunkenly from turgid soap opera to soft-core porn, descending at times to low camp.

| Original Score: 1/5 | Aug 7, 2008

This is trashy exploitation at its clumsiest. Once more, a Spike Lee movie has been undone by the earnestness of being important.

| Apr 27, 2007

Trouble is, the overlong narrative, however entertaining from minute to minute, is a mess.

| Jun 24, 2006

I needed stronger and more balanced characters to really care what happened.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | May 26, 2006

Whatever you think of Spike Lee, when he has the faith in his talent and material and is able to be political without the dogma, he's one of the best filmmakers to come out of America in the 1980's.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Dec 6, 2005

Lee does capture the terror a serial killer can wreak upon the community, but his concentration on the weak characters hurts in the long run.

| Original Score: C+ | Apr 9, 2005

The story makes very important points, and shows us a graphic parable of the wages of sin. But the ugliness along the way will be too much for some viewers....

| Original Score: B- | Jan 15, 2005

Disappointing.

Full Review | Original Score: 5/10 | Aug 11, 2004

Spike Lee's most ambitious movie, is joltingly inspired at times. It's also offensively redundant and needs editing.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jun 28, 2004

The cast sizzles.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | May 20, 2003