Red Hook Summer

Flik Royale is a pampered 13-year-old boy from Atlanta who is sent to live with his preacher grandfather, Da Good Bishop Enoch Rouse, in Red Hook, Brooklyn.{{cite web Flik struggles to connect with his religious grandfather, and clashes with him over religion, technology, and other subjects. He develops a friendship with a girl named Chazz and encounters Box, a gangster who used to attend Enoch's church. In the midst of a sermon, a strange man strolls into the back of the church and accuses Bishop Enoch of molesting him 15 years earlier in Georgia. Enoch admits to the abuse, and says that it was subsequently covered up by his church, which paid the boy's family hush money and let Enoch go free to start a new life in Brooklyn.{{cite news Flik is sent home to his mother, and says goodbye to Chazz. ==Cast==

• Clarke Peters as Da Good Bishop Enoch Rouse • Nate Parker as Box • Thomas Jefferson Byrd as Deacon Zee • Toni Lysaith as Chazz Morningstar • Jules Brown as Flik Royale • Jon Batiste as Da Organist T.K. Hazelton • Colman Domingo as adult Blessing Rowe • Heather Simms as Sister Sharon Morningstar • James Ransone as Kevin • De'Adre Aziza as Colleen Royale • Isiah Whitlock Jr. as Detective Flood • Tracy Camilla Johns as Mother Darling • Spike Lee appears briefly as Mookie, the main character from his 1989 film Do the Right Thing, wearing his original "Sal's Pizzeria" shirt. (Uncredited) ==Production==

Principal photography lasted three weeks, "on a small budget, guerrilla-style, like Lee's first feature film." Red Hook Summer marked the first time that Lee appeared in one of his films since Summer of Sam (1999). ==Release==

A 135-minute version of Red Hook Summer premiered at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival; The film was released on August 10, 2012, in select theaters of the New York City area and was released in Los Angeles and other parts of the United States on August 24, 2012. The film reached 41 theaters at its peak. ==Reception==

On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 58% based on 66 reviews, with an average rating of 5.46/10. The website's critics consensus reads: "Red Hook Summer is just as bold and energetic as Spike Lee's best work, but its story is undermined by a jarring plot twist in the final act." On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 48 out of 100, based on 25 critics, indicating "average or mixed reviews". Peter Debruge of Variety said "It's fiery, passionate stuff, at times inelegantly presented, but impossible to ignore." Roger Ebert gave the film 2½ out of four stars saying it "plays as if the director is making it up as he goes along. That's not entirely a bad thing, although some will be thrown off-balance by an abrupt plot development halfway through that appears entirely out of the blue and is so shocking that the movie never really recovers. Here is Lee at his most spontaneous and sincere, but he could have used another screenplay draft." ==Lee's commentary==

In an audio commentary that accompanies the DVD, and a real church organist on the Church's Hammond organ. Lee points out some small local themes in the movie: • "Asthma is one of the issues we deal with in this film," exacerbated by the air pollution brought by the cruise liners that call at Red Hook. (Lee is asthmatic.) • Gentrification. Around the central projects there is gentrification on both sides, represented by the fresh cement in front of a house, which the two child leads deface. • Technology — Flic's constant use of his iPad 2 (some of what he shot on his iPad was used in the movie); communicating via Skype with his mother. • The very controversial Ikea store. • Red Hook is the only place from which the front of the Statue of Liberty can be seen (it faces its donor nation, France). ==See also==