first , i'd like to say it's nice to have spike lee vindicate himself after doing something like girl 6 . get on the bus is easily the best film he has made since do the right thing with the exception of maybe malcolm x . spike does in this film what he does best--he presents issues that face society in an unbiased manner and lets the audience sort their feelings on their own . i love a film that engages my mind . the story is about a busload of black men that board in south central los angeles and drive across the country to the million man march in washington d . c . the film was funded by fifteen african-american men and shot in just 18 days . this is another example of expert filmmaking ( writing , directing , acting ) that i hope the oscars do not overlook . the screenwriter , reggie rock bythewood is very talented . however , i would say that the screenplay is a little weak in a few spots . this may be due to the film's hurried production . but i tell you that nothing in the script is so bad as to detract from the better scenes . the greatest aspect of the screenplay is that the ideas behind the million man march and the reasons for going are expressed without directly involving the march itself . this makes those ideas much more powerful because it eliminates the inclusion of minister farrakhan , to which many would disregard the march's message in favor of claiming it racist and sexist . this idea is also expressed in another way . there is a member of the nation of islam on the bus who never says a word and never gets involved in any of the scenes . his presence is a symbol of the march , in that , even though the nation of islam was there and organized the march , the march was not about the nation of islam . spike lee is one of the best filmmakers working today . in get on the bus , he's trying something different--the sure sign of a filmmaker that understands that the learning process never stops . here , he meshes his ever-evolving style with that of a documentarian's eye . the bus ride feels " captured " by the filmmaker . although there is plenty of hand-held camerawork , it is as though spike lee was able to film a documentary and still maintain effective use of dollies , cranes and tripods . it is an astonishing feat from a filmmaker's perspective and an effective technique for anyone watching . as i watched the film , i noticed two things about the audience . the first was that anytime a character made a slant toward one of the homosexual characters , the audience laughed hysterically . the scenes were obviously written to be funny , but i think that the predictability of our own stereotypes was what the screenwriter was knowingly commenting on . i back this up with another scene where the bus stops at a roadside diner in tennessee . the instant we see all the white faces inside , the audience expects a confrontation . in fact , everyone gets along pretty well . even when ossie davis explains that steer wrestling was invented by a black cowboy , his listener responds with , " how about that . " it's fairly obvious that these two scenes say more about the audience than the characters . but then , that's what i expect from a spike lee joint . 
