Spike Lee has become one of filmdom’s few “name brand” directors.  His films are as iconic and instantly recognizable as those of Scorsese, Spielberg or Hitchcock.  And whether you love him or hate him, his films often provide a voice that is rarely heard in cinema.  He recently scored the biggest box office hit of his career with 2006’s Inside Man, a plot-hole filled (but nonetheless fun) heist movie starring Denzel Washington and Jodie Foster.  It was interesting in that it was Lee’s first genre picture (unless you consider “Black” a genre).  So when word circulated that he was making a World War II film, it became hotly anticipated.  If there’s ever been a major war film tackled by an African-American director, I sure can’t think of it.  So to see Spike Lee take on one of the staples of American cinema would prove, at worst, interesting and at best, fascinating. 

The film follows the 92^nd Infantry Division on patrol just outside of a small town in Italy in the fall of 1944.  Commonly referred to as Buffalo Soldiers, the 92^nd Infantry was a segregated unit comprised of Black infantrymen.  The film opens in the ‘80s with a murder.  In the murderer’s apartment, police find a piece of long lost Italian art so valuable that there is no way the suspect (a postal worker) could have ever afforded it.  The art find leads us to a flashback. However, is something a flashback if said flashback constitutes 98% of the film?  This is where the movie starts the first in a series of missteps.

We’re primed for a film that toggles back and forth between a WWII and a murder investigation, but we won’t return to the murder until literally the last 5 minutes of the film.  The film follows four soldiers trapped behind enemy lines.  While screen time is split fairly evenly between the four, the heart of the film is Trane, played by Omar Benson Miller.  He’s a large but gentle presence in his unit.  He’s an innocent sprit and a little slow.  And by “a little” I mean “a lot.”  But he’s become something of a good luck charm and seems to posses the ability to walk heavy through fire unscathed, almost as if invisible.  However, Miller’s attempt to portray someone with below average intelligence combined with his character’s Southern accent at times bordered disconcertingly on minstrelsy.  If this wasn’t a Spike Lee Joint, I’m pretty sure there would be some angry op-eds being composed even as I type this.

Stranded in enemy territory, Trane comes across an Italian boy in danger and saves his life.  The boy, named Angelo and played by Matteo Sciabordi, takes to Trane.  Trane, in effect, adopts the boy and is his protector throughout the film.

It’s an odd storyline given the fact that Spike Lee virtually coined the phrase “Magical Negro”.  For those of you unaware, the phrase refers to the cinematic tradition of using Black characters in films for the sole purpose of helping and/or teaching a lesson to the White protagonist.  (Think Will Smith in The Legend of Bagger Vance or Morgan Freeman in Million Dollar Baby.)  While there have been good movies made that use this device, taken as a pattern it tends to reduce African-Americans to the status of “good luck charms.”  So, it was quite surprising to see Lee utilize the stereotype.  Especially in light of the fact that we never see anything in the movie that would lead the viewer to believe that it’s a commentary on the stereotype’s previous usage in film. 

Michael Ealy plays Bishop Cummings.  Cummings is frustrated with life in the States for Black people.  And that frustration only grows when he sees how readily the Italians take them in.  They’re not concerned about their skin color.  He remarks that he feels more welcome in a foreign country than he ever has in America.  Ealy’s performance at times seems jarringly anachronistic.  His line readings and mannerisms simply don’t seem like that of a man in 1944.  The way he speaks and comports himself is much more a product of the 20^th Century.

The last third of the movie ends up bogged down in a subplot about betrayal within an anti-fascist resistance movement that has been waging guerilla attacks from the countryside surrounding the Italian village.  Suddenly we’re introduced to whole new cast of characters and flashbacks.  So we now have flashbacks within our flashback. 

The film is not completely without merit.  There are some remarkably good portions including a flashback (within a flashback) of the Black soldiers stateside being refused service at an ice cream parlor while German P.O.W.s  are allowed to dine.  There is also a riveting but disturbing sequence in which a horrible war atrocity is committed.  But ultimately, Lee’s attempt to make a sweeping war epic instead ends up a jumbled, overly long (at 2 hours and 40 minutes) film that completely lacks focus.  If you want to see a film about Black soldiers, you’d be better off renting Glory.

On a scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being Do The Right Thing and 1 being She Hate Me, Miracle At St. Anna gets a 5.