Geriaction Cinema: Introduction

Abstract

TO SAY that Da 5 Bloods (Spike Lee, 2020) is self-conscious in its engagement with cinematic precedents would be an understatement. The Vietnam veterans at the heart of the narrative directly criticize Rambo: First Blood Part II (George P. Cosmatos, 1985) and Missing in Action (Joseph Zito, 1984) as manifestations of Hollywood “trying to go back and win the Vietnam War,” even as they themselves return to Ho Chi Minh City decades after the conflict on a quest to address unfinished business. The riverboat trip that takes them back into the jungle where they will confront their demons is accompanied by Richard Wagner’s “Ride of the Valkyries,” adding Apocalypse Now (Francis Ford Coppola, 1979) to a long list of overt film references. Even amongst such programmatically knowing intertextuality, one element of Da 5 Bloods stands out as jarringly nonnaturalistic. The numerous flashbacks to the war focus on the four main characters and their fallen comrade, Stormin’ Norman. For the purposes of narrative verisimilitude, all five men should be in their late teens or twenties, yet Paul, David, Otis, and Eddie remain in their sixties, still played by the actors who portray them in their present-day manifestations. No attempt is made to de-age these actors, either through makeup or digital manipulation, resulting in an incongruous spectacle that unavoidably draws our attention to the artifice of the filmmaking process. We might argue that the effect is to place the audience on a cognitive level with the four main characters, whose flashbacks we are witnessing as they look back on their youth through the prism of age and bitter experience. This reading is supported by the film’s official press Geriaction Cinema: