RIOTUS

It’s been almost 20 years since Denzel Washington and Spike Lee teamed up on a film. A director/actor duo that make excellent work together, the two have teamed up again this year to remake or reimagine Akira Kurosawa’s High and Low, itself adapted from the novel King’s Ransom by Evan Hunter under the pen name Ed McBain. This film serves as a fantastic homage, but what interests me the most is how Lee and Washington utilize this film to explore ideas of Black Art within the current landscape of American late capitalism. The many changes in the music industry, conflict within generations of hip-hop, and the waning influence of New York on Rap music. Class is huge in this, as it is in each version of the story, but with the use of biblical names and in a sprawling metropolis like New York, it resonates differently.

Here, music mogul David King (Washington), the best ear in the business, is making a major move to buy back his label before they sell it is sold to a Private Equity company. Things are going great with his plan until King receives a call that his son, Trey (Aubrey Joseph), has been kidnapped and that the person on the other line wants $17.5 million in Swiss currency. The twist in this story is that the kidnapper made a mistake and accidentally kidnapped his godson, Kyle (Elijah Wright). Now King David, as he’s called, must decide if he’s going to save his best friend’s son, Kyle, or chalk the boy up to the game and instead pull off his plan to save his company.

Washington gives an outstanding performance as David King; he feels so comfortable in this role, yet I can sense the influences of music moguls in this character, particularly in the charismatic ways and the aspects that make the music industry problematic. His ambition, drive, and ego push him to make the impossible possible, and he dares anyone to try to stop him. The relationship he has with Jeffrey Wright’s Paul Christopher, an ex-con who’s his best friend and right-hand man. These two men, one of high class and the other of a way lower class, are something we’ve seen before, but with Hip Hop and Rap music, it takes on a different tone. With Rap, no matter how high you go, you need to be still connected to the streets, the gutter. Phrases like “get it out of the mud” and “get it how you live” ring proverbs within the ideology of rap music.

Wright’s Paul is thankful and defers to King’s grace and leadership. His experiences and connection to the streets and the borough in which they both grew up, in the Bronx, make him an essential connection for King. Yet, King doesn’t really give Paul and his son, Kyle, the means to reach the levels that he has achieved with his perfect family, including his wife, Pam, and son, Trey. With Kyle, you can already see an almost similar setup – being the best friend to the Prince doesn’t actually make you a prince. Washington and Wright, both actors who have complete control of their skills and can bring something closer to themselves or the worlds they come from to their roles, carry this film.

Yet with that, the role of Yung Felon played by A$AP Rocky, the person who turns their lives upside down with the kidnapping, is a person who feels hopeless in this game, where, through all the changes to how music works, a good rapper from the Bronx can’t get on anymore. A person who essentially lost his dreams and saw no other recourse but to do such a vile act. Many years ago, 50 Cent publicly blamed Ebro Darden, then host of the Hot 97 radio morning show and program director, for failing New York rap by not cultivating and showcasing local talent. He felt that was the reason why NY’s status as a dominant sonic force in rap compared to its highs in previous eras.

That’s what Yung Felon’s character felt like for me. We see David King’s home, its walls covered in works by famous Black painters, pictures of music geniuses and legends, the character himself an amalgamation of LA Reid, Andre Harrell, and others. But what about the next generation, and what about the music? Are they using their influence and power to carefully cultivate this garden of Black art that some say they are so focused on protecting? Rocky playing this character adds another dimension, as he was part of a generation of rappers that, especially after the great lyrical coastal war between two of them last year, had such a profound effect on rap music. Rocky’s explosion, part of the A$AP Mob, was that he was from Harlem and didn’t sound like he was from NY but more like a southern artist. Yet he and the crew built up such a wave they couldn’t be denied. I don’t know if that’s as possible now as it was then.

Can the push to an attention economy work for artistic expression? Can the drive for attention even be artistic? Will those in power now completely give up to the tech companies and Private Equity firms, just sell human expression for quick money now? Denzel has been repeating the line in his press tour, “Not all money is good money,” and it rang through my mind the whole time I was watching the film, as I feel it fits the whole message of the film. Highest 2 Lowest will work for some as a great crime film, but for me, it’s an exploration of Black art and whether the older generation has done right by the generations that followed.