Taglines: A Spike Lee joint.
Mo’ Better Blues opens with Bleek as a child learning to play the trumpet, his friends want him to come out and play but mother insists he finish his lessons. Bleek grows into adulthood and forms his own band – The Bleek Gilliam Quartet. The story of Bleek’s and Shadow’s friendly rivalry on stage which spills into their professional relationship and threatens to tear apart the quartet.
Mo’ Better Blues is a 1990 musical drama film starring Denzel Washington, Wesley Snipes, and Spike Lee, who also directed. It follows a period in the life of fictional jazz trumpeter Bleek Gilliam (played by Washington) as a series of bad decisions result in his jeopardizing both his relationships and his playing career.
The film focuses on themes of friendship, loyalty, honesty, cause-and-effect, and ultimately salvation. It features the music of the Branford Marsalis quartet and Terence Blanchard on trumpet. The film was released five months after the death of Robin Harris and is dedicated to his memory.
About the Story
The film begins with a scene set in Brooklyn, New York in 1969. A group of four boys walk up to Bleek Gilliam’s brownstone and ask him to come out and play baseball with them. Bleek’s mother insists that he continue his trumpet lesson, to his chagrin. His father becomes concerned that Bleek will grow up to be a sissy, and a family argument ensues. In the end, Bleek continues playing his trumpet, and his friends go away.
The next scene brings us to the present (over twenty years later), with an adult Bleek (Denzel Washington) performing on the trumpet at a busy nightclub with his jazz band, The Bleek Quintet (Jeff “Tain” Watts, Wesley Snipes, Giancarlo Esposito and Bill Nunn). Giant (Spike Lee, one of his boyhood friends from the previous scene and current manager of Bleek’s band), is waiting in the wings, and advises him to stop allowing his saxophone player Shadow Henderson (Snipes) to grandstand with long solos.
The next morning Bleek wakes up with his girlfriend, Indigo Downes (Joie Lee). She leaves to go to class, while he meets his father by the Brooklyn Bridge for a game of catch, telling him that while he does like Indigo, he likes other women too and is not ready to make a commitment. Later in the day while he is practicing his trumpet, another woman named Clarke Bentancourt (Cynda Williams) visits him. She suggests he fire Giant as his manager; he suggests that they make love (which he refers to as “mo’ better”). She bites his lip and he becomes upset about it, saying, “I make my living with my lips”, as he examines the bleeding bottom lip.
Giant is with his bookie, betting on baseball. Then he goes to the nightclub and argues with the doormen about what time to let the patrons into the club. He meets Bleek inside with the rest of the band, except for the pianist, Left Hand Lacey (Esposito), who arrives late with his French girlfriend and is scolded by Giant. Later Giant goes to the club owners’ office, points out how busy the club has been since Bleek and his band began playing there, and unsuccessfully attempts to renegotiate their contract.
Mo’ Better Blues 1990)
Directed by: Spike Lee
Starring: Denzel Washington, Spike Lee, Wesley Snipes, Giancarlo Esposito, Robin Harris, Joie Lee, Bill Nunn, John Turturro, Dick Anthony Williams, Cynda Williams
Screenplay by: Spike Lee
Production Design by: Wynn Thomas
Cinematography by: Ernest R. Dickerson
Film Editing by: Samuel D. Pollard
Costume Design by: Ruth E. Carter
Set Decoration by: Ted Glass
Music by: Bill Lee
Distributed by: Universal Pictures
Release Date: August 3, 1990
Hits: 142
