10 - Masculinity and the Phallus in Mo' Better Blues

Show Notes

A discussion of the theme of masculinity and the phallus in Spike Lee's 1990 film Mo' Better Blues, with particular emphasis on the psychic and material dimensions of phallic struggle between Bleek and Shadow. I am interested in how the psychic life of the stage is deployed in the struggle between Bleek and Shadow offstage to possess, in whatever register, their mutual sexual interest - Clark. And also how in the film's title song - "Mo' Better Blues" - is performed outside the phallic economy, articulating different masculine possibilities that are, in the film, otherwise only explored in the domestic life of Bleek and Indigo that closes the film. 

What is Spike Lee's Joints?

20-30 minute reflections on particular Spike Lee films, from School Daze up through Black KkKlansman - précis for a book-length study of Lee's cinema, reflections on a course I've taught a number of times at Amherst College and University of Maryland. In these podcast pieces, I pay particular attention to issues of race, class, gender, and sexuality as they emerge inside particular films and in the history-memory of African American life. How does Lee's cinema think? How does sound and image help us understand representation of Black bodies, Black people, and Black life? What are Lee's innovations, what challenges does he present us with in sound and image? And how can we see questions of masculinity, gender and racial formation, historical violence, and institutional violence evolve across his decades of filmmaking?