The 18 Best Spike Lee Movies, Ranked

From ‘Do the Right Thing’ to ‘Da 5 Bloods,’ the prolific director continues to churn out essential films.

Spike Lee is , without a doubt , among the most important American directors who has ever lived . As much a personality as he is a talented storyteller , Lee is a fertile movie maker who has become one of pop refinement ’s most recognisable faces . He established his bona fides with the 1986 depressed - budget charmerShe ’s Got ta Have It , which arrived properly as Hollywood ’s indie scene was heating up , and proved to be irreproachable whenDo the Right Thingblossomed into an prompt classic three years later . Since then , Lee has made more than 30 movies , including social dramatic play , documentary , and concert picture show . you could also discern him on New York University ’s campus , where he teaches , and courtside at Knicks game , cheering on his pet team .

In festivity of Lee ’s still - hot career , we rank his 18 best movie thus far .

18.Jungle Fever(1991)

pack with engrossing performances , promontory - scratching asides , and arouse ideas , Jungle Feverremains one of Lee ’s most brassy films , a quixotic dramatic event about class and slipstream told with formal severeness and startling thematic swings . In one of his career - best performances , Wesley Snipes playact Flipper Purify , an established Black designer with a married woman and daughter who finds himself go after an Italian American fair sex ( Annabella Sciorra ) hired as his temporary secretary . Zeroing in on professional anxieties , social codes , and sexual psychoneurosis with his typical level of precision , Lee ’s moving picture often feel like it ’s in conversation with itself in the good way , exploring sly concepts while grounding the dramatic event in everyday conflicts and relatable emotions . Even the share that do n’t quite work are invigorate by a wildly impressive support cast , including Samuel L. Jackson , John Turturro , Ossie Davis , Ruby Dee , Tim Robbins , Halle Berry , and more . — Dan Jackson

17.David Byrne’s American Utopia(2020)

In the thick of the pandemic , when Broadway was shut down , Spike Lee and David Byrne gave us a endowment : Lee ’s filmed version of Byrne ’s electrifying leg showAmerican Utopia . The concert flick feel , in some way , like an homage to both artists ' previous study . Byrne , alongside director Jonathan Demme , made the genre ’s pinnacle withStop prepare Sense , while Lee’sPassing Strangeinnovated stage productions appropriate on film . Their alchemy that was leap to work . As Byrne and his squad of dumfounding social dancer and musician big businessman through their repertoire , Lee ’s camera highlights the elaborateness of Annie - B Parson ’s stage dancing while also ask the consultation closer than they will ever get in a Broadway theatre . It ’s a will to the apparent movement of the human body , an thrill experience enclosed in a screenland . — Esther Zuckerman

16.Chi-Raq(2015)

A searing barn burner that turnsLysistratainto a genre - defying melodic , Chi - Raqtakes an audacious premise and creates a sarcasm at once amusing and stark . Using the struggle rallying cry " no peace , no snatch , " the girlfriends of two war crowd on Chicago ’s South Side recoup sex from their partners until the violence ends . The woman ’s strike escalates , but the men ca n’t bring themselves to put away their gun for hire , resulting in military and constabulary intervention . Chi - Raqboasts one of Lee ’s starry casts — Teyonah Parris , Nick Cannon , Wesley Snipes , Angela Bassett , Jennifer Hudson , Samuel L. Jackson , John Cusack , La La Anthony — and scrappiest productions while still tackling touching issues in his signature style . — Matthew Jacobs

15.Mo' Better Blues(1990)

Tasked with following up his masterpieceDo the Right matter , Lee decided to turn his attention to the past , examining the professional and wild-eyed entanglements of malarky trumpeter Bleek Gilliam ( Denzel Washington ) . The late-’60s period setting allow the film maker to dazzle with his gift for production design and costuming , complot a whole world of gage - filled baseball club , cramped hall , and sweaty sleeping room . observe Bleek and his ring onstage is also a reminder that few film maker have such a piercing understanding of how to shoot musical performances . In his first collaboration with Washington , Lee allows his charismatic star to roleplay a man trap by his own warring impulses and his originative passion . It ’s one of Lee ’s incisive workings about prowess and ambition . — DJ

14.BlacKkKlansman(2018)

After more than three decades of notable films , Lee in the end mystify a sweep of Oscar nominations forBlacKkKlansman , including his first - ever Best Director nod and a win for Best Adapted Screenplay . Like many of his films , the drama , based on Ron Stallworth ’s 2014 memoir , is complicated and seasonable , telling Stallworth ’s story of how he as a Black detective infiltrated the Colorado Springs chapter of the KKK in the ' 70s while receive racial discrimination on the police force . As Stallworth , John David Washingtonis given a star fomite , and the deft Adam Driver accomplishes an challenging twofold performance as Detective Philip Zimmerman , Stallworth ’s Judaic pardner who decease underground . Although the film can take on like a procedural , Lee elevates its complexities by weave in powerful monologues from anti - racist activists , nods to racist moments in moving picture history , and collage of present - day footage . It ’s as flirt with a criminal offense story as it is a disconcert indictment of hatred . — Sadie Bell

13.School Daze(1988)

In arguably themost iconic momentin the HBCU - set musical comedySchool Daze , Laurence Fishburne ’s campus activist Vaughn " Dap " Dunlap runs across the quad to call into the camera " Wake up ! " It plays out literally in the movie ’s final scene , as Dap rushes into student residence to get his classmates out of bed . But the 4th - rampart break is aspire at everyone , the charactersandwatchers of Lee ’s 2nd feature motion picture , in which he star as Dap ’s first cousin Half - Pint , to get a freaking clue about myriad racial and political item he ’s made through the tale . coiffe on homecoming weekend at the fictional Mission College in Atlanta , School Dazetouches on a bit of everything — colorism within the Black residential district , natural hair , how Black women are do by , the smuggled in-between class , burdensome student workloads , apartheid , fraternity culture , and , of row , the grandness of historically Black colleges and university — which at metre makes the flick feel slightly fractured , but no less compelling . A prescient piece that got Lee and his gang kicked off shooting at existent HBCUs due to worry about how they ’d be portray before wrapping at Morris Brown College , School Dazewoke up audiences with its necessary messaginglong before things likeDear White PeopleandHigher Learningcame around . — Leanne Butkovic

12.He Got Game(1998)

Unsurprisingly , Lee ’s take on the " sports moving-picture show " is not a conventional underdog tale . Known for both his iconic Nike commercials and his appearances courtside at Knicks games , the film maker understands the complexities of professional basketball , particularly the interplay between money and strenuosity , at a deep , granular level . He Got Gamestars real - life hoops star Ray Allen as a talented young college enlistee and Denzel Washington as his riotous father , a convict murderer freed from prison by the regulator to recruit his Word for the regulator ’s favourite university . It ’s a provocative assumption that Lee expand on in his typically sprawling personal manner , indicting the systems of wilful exploitation surrounding basketball while still finding beauty and poetry in the game itself . — DJ

11.When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts(2006)

Spike Lee experience exactly how to egg on a story to get his viewers to direct their ire at society ’s political failures without spoonful - feeding them , and his Emmy - winning four - part HBO docuseries about the governmental bungles at every degree and its human impact during and after Hurricane Katrina devastate New Orleans will make your parentage boil . Lee channels the spirit of the metropolis , soundtracking the film to NOLA malarkey and tapping local artists to lend their spokesperson . He talks to topical anesthetic , community of interests leaders , journalists , and politicians about what go down in the tempest ’s wake , his camera and editing selection never flinching from the inhumane horrors of neighborhoods in peril . While he pours empathy upon those affect , he has none to spare ( and righteously so ) for official , particularly George Bush and his government ’s incompetence and lack of compassion in their crisis response . Almost two decades afterWhen the Levees Brokecame out , it remains an enormously important documentary and a of the essence account of one of the U.S. ’s worst recent natural disasters made even high-risk by the citizenry in power.—LB

10.Da 5 Bloods(2020)

After the Oscars at long last recognise Lee for his employment onBlackKklansman , it was shock how much hisbold follow - upwas neglect . Lee tackled and revitalize a long - gestating task about a chemical group of Vietnam veteran who return to uncover a buried fortune near where their police squad drawing card ( Chadwick Boseman in a obsess execution shortly before his own expiry ) go . Lee and Kevin Willmott rewrite the existing screenplay to focus on a group of black-market former soldier grappling with their role in American imperialism overseas as their own state disfranchise fatal citizens . It ’s an almost shockingly bloodstained activity larger-than-life with a propelling hoarded wealth hunt of a plot of ground that also stops to consider atrocities at place and abroad . And it ’s all anchored by a sensational performance from Delroy Lindo — one of the most egregious Oscar repulse in late year — as the Trump - supporting member of the chemical group , whose hubristic downfall is Shakespearian in its cataclysm . — EZ

9.4 Little Girls(1997)

Spike Lee ’s heartbreaking nonfiction photographic film recalls the events of September 15 , 1963 , when Klansmen detonated a bomb calorimeter at the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham , Alabama , killing four young missy . parse the violent streak against Black Americans during the civil rights movement , empathizing with the families who suffered the greatest loss imaginable , and nab an interview with George Wallace — the segregator governor of Alabama at the time of the attack — whose atonement for fueling racist ideology can barely breach his cantankerous shell,4 Little Girlsis a masterpiece that needs to be seen and remembered . — DJ

8.Clockers(1995)

If any Lee film could be called underrated , it’sClockers , a down - and - muddied adaptation of Richard Price ’s 1992 novel that was previously helmed by Martin Scorsese before Scorsese decided to direct his passion projectCasinoinstead . Lee ’s film stars8 Mile ’s Mekhi Phifer in his debut use as Ronald " Strike " Dunham , a " clocker"—a street - grade drug dealer — whose spirit is overthrow by slaying when his local drug lord Rodney Little ( Delroy Lindo ) recount him to bolt down one of his monger who keeps stealing the supply . When the man ends up dead , homicide detectives Klein ( Harvey Keitel ) and Mazilli ( John Turturro ) patrol the street seek to find out who did it , but in a maze of false confessions and contradicting narratives , the occupation is much harder than it seems , particularly once the rest of the clockers commence to turn on Strike . — Emma Stefansky

7.She’s Gotta Have It(1986)

The film that set in motion Spike Lee ’s vocation also immediately showcased his brand of wry mental capacity and aid to detail . Filmed in black and white , this romantic comedy of misplay star Tracy Camilla Johns as Nola Darling , a in writing artist living the dreaming in an enviably beautiful Brooklyn apartment while juggle three suitors : mature yet impassive Jamie Overstreet ( Tommy Redmond Hicks ) , narcissistic model Greer Childs ( John Canada Terrell ) , and boyish and tight - talking bicycle courier Mars Blackmon ( Spike Lee himself , the first of many roles he ’d play in his own plastic film ) . Unable to commit to any one of them , Nola cherishes her intimate freedom and refuse to tie herself to monogamy . The tables turn when the three lovers touch up and compare note , expressing frustration that Nola refuses to settle down with one man , and decide to call her four flush . The tone shift in the third routine of the film and its surprise coda further show how dextrously Lee balances comedy with drama , while always let his characters to remain reliable versions of themselves . — ES

6.Bamboozled(2000)

Working in a standardized register as Elia Kazan’sA Face in the Crowdand Sydney Lumet’sNetwork , Bamboozledexposes the moral rot within the entertainment industriousness and American acculturation without engaging in the self-satisfied back - patting that undermine so much contemporary satire . Damon Wayans play Pierre Delacroix , a Harvard - educate boob tube administrator who attempt to get fired from his soul - sucking line by redact on the most offensive program he can think of . His creation , a comedic miscellanea show involving performers in blackface calledThe New Millennium Minstrel Show , proves irresistible to the populace , sending Delacroix down a path to personal ruination . chiefly dash on MiniDV cameras , the film has a digital smeariness and a high-strung intensity that complement the bump around story shift and unapologetically bare comedy . Riotously funny and achingly sad , Bamboozledplunders the yesteryear while turning a prophetic eye to the future . — disc jockey

5.Inside Man(2006)

Inside Manis one of the film producer ’s sweat to conform his flair into a studio apartment legal action movie . He brings his hocus-pocus to Russell Gewirtz ’s bank - robbery screenplay , creating something passing watchable that fall between a big - budgetheist movieand a ' 70s - barrack business district New York thriller . Denzel Washington plays Detective Keith Frazier , an NYPD hostage treater who ’s call to a scene on a post-9/11 Wall Street where masked robbers have take command of a bank and forced hostage to coiffure in their exact disguise . When the bank founder ( Christopher Plummer ) charter a fixer ( Jodie Foster ) , Lee plays against heist - movie trope to keep you on your toe until the very end . The photographic film begins with the lead robber ( Clive Owen ) declaring he ’s developed an impenetrable stickup , and while his program ends up working to perfection , it ’s Lee ’s commission that makes the movie ’s twirl and turns so sharp . — SB

4.Malcolm X(1992)

Often biopics skin to do justice to their subject subject , but not Spike Lee ’s toweringMalcolm X , which adaptsThe Autobiography of Malcolm Xinto a sprawling , nearly three - and - a - half - minute film . Lee trace Malcolm ’s organic evolution from zoot - suit - wearing gambler to devout Muslim to national icon and activist , all the while act as with panache and tone but never taking out from the primal performance . After their collaboration onMo ' Better Blues , Lee entrusts Denzel Washington with carrying the story , incarnate all of Malcolm ’s brilliance as well as his contradictions . All these year later on , it is still noteworthy thatMalcolm Xwas even made : It ’s long , it ’s controversial , and it ’s arresting . — EZ

3.Crooklyn(1994)

In between the heavy dramasMalcolm XandClockers , Lee made his most charming picture — and his most personal . A slice - of - life syndicate comedy told principally from the position of scrappy 9 - year - honest-to-god Troy Carmichael ( Zelda Harris),Crooklynis loosely based on Lee ’s own puerility . He indite the script with two of his siblings , borrowing their female parent ’s illness as the foundation for Troy ’s occur - of - geezerhood . Despite its bittersweet undercurrent , the motion-picture show thrives on Lee ’s whimsical sense of humor , as evidenced whena fight about look out TVspills out of the kids ’ sleeping room and finds them all — Mom ( a fantastic Alfre Woodard ) and Dad ( Delroy Lindo ) include — tumbling down the stair while The Staples Singers ’ “ I ’ll Take You There ” plays . — MJ

2.25th Hour(2002)

Before David Benioff co - ranGame of Thrones , he published his debut novelThe 25th Hour , a slow - burning drama about a human race ’s last 24 hour of exemption before go to prison for dealing drug . Spike Lee ’s adaptation , which came out a year later , stars Edward Norton as convicted dealer Monty Brogan , a soft - spoken man with questionable taste in facial tomentum who was rat on to the DEA and now face a seven - year prison sentence that he ’s panic-stricken to serve . compulsive to find out who betrayed him before he and his male parent ( Brian Cox ) drive to the prison house in the morning , Monty spends his last night of exemption questioning the other dealers while also judge to have a beneficial time with his loved ones : his childhood friends Frank ( Barry Pepper ) and timid schoolteacher Jacob ( Philip Seymour Hoffman ) , and his girlfriend Naturelle ( Rosario Dawson ) , who may or may not be the treasonist . — eastward

1.Do the Right Thing(1989)

It ’s not dramatic to callDo the Right Thingthe blueprint , because itis . While it was n’t Lee ’s first appearance , it was for sure the film that made him the director we cognize today . Over one spicy summer 24-hour interval , Lee explores the rising tensions between a Brooklyn region ’s Black resident and an Italian American family who own a local pizzeria . In 1989 , Lee was able to dissect complicated racial political science through one urban neighborhood — between Mookie ( Lee ) and Pino ( John Turturro ) , Pino and Sal ( Danny Aiello)—and turn up both the joy and unhappiness of its residents . The motion picture was revolutionary at its sentence , and it sadly still reverberates decades later . — Kerensa Cadenas

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