New York City during the hottest summer on record. Flaring tempers in the streets. Social unrest everywhere you turn.
No, I’m not talking about the modern-day Big Apple. This is 1977, and it’s the year the Son of Sam murders rocked the city to its core. It’s also the setting for one of Spike Lee’s most underrated and unusual films to date.
Summer of Sam turns twenty-five years old this month, which somehow seems like an eternity and only a split second ago. The film is at once a product of the late 1990s and entirely timeless.
After all, it deals with themes that still resonate today: bigotry, homophobia, infidelity, climate issues, and the crushing hopelessness of finding meaning in meaningless acts.
Let's take a look at Spike Lee's iconic horror classic Summer of Sam.
Despite its powerful message and execution, Summer of Sam is far from Spike Lee’s most famous or celebrated film. In fact, it wasn’t even his first outing when it came to writing and directing a blistering summer-in-NYC film.
In 1989, a full decade before Summer of Sam, Lee released Do the Right Thing, which soon became his calling card as well as a cultural touchstone that remains as relevant today as ever.
Summer of Sam is at once worlds apart and only a few streets away from that film. However, if you haven’t seen it before, then don’t go into the movie expecting a conventional true-crime tale.
Instead, the story focuses primarily on a group of friends in the Bronx, some of whom are associated with the mob, as they navigate what it means to live in a world where they’re not the most fearsome figures on the street anymore.
There's something so fascinating about a movie that uses the Son of Sam killings merely as a backdrop for visceral drama all its own.
We get glimpses of murderer David Berkowitz, but we never get inside his head quite the way we do with the rest of the characters. And the film is most definitely better for it, giving us insight into how to survive a smoldering, dangerous world.
The cast is top-notch with John Leguizamo leading the way as lothario hairdresser Vinny whose drug habit (and cheating habit) are bound to get him in trouble before the last reel.
Mira Sorvino is endearing as his cuckolded wife Dionna who keeps refusing to see his infidelity until she can no longer hide from the truth.
When Dionna becomes no more than a background character by the end—mostly just mentioned and rarely seen—the film falters just a little without the heart that she brings to the story. Then again, perhaps that’s the point: by the searing climax, there’s not much room left for sentimentality or sweetness.
In another noteworthy role, Jennifer Esposito co-stars as Ruby, the slut-shamed sister of one of Vinny’s friends, and her subtly beautiful and devastating performance makes you lament she wasn’t cast in more major projects over the last quarter century.
And then there’s Adrien Brody who portrays Ritchie, the bisexual punk rocker and long-time friend of Vinny who shows up back in town just in time to arouse suspicion that he could be the Son of Sam murderer.
It would be another three years before Brody would turn in his Oscar-winning performance in The Pianist, but Summer of Sam announced him as a serious talent to watch.
As a teenager, I was completely enthralled by Ritchie. I owned the VHS of Summer of Sam, just so I could marvel at him. He was cool and punk and unafraid to be himself.
To this day, I’m still not sure if my teenage self wanted to be him or be with him. Either way, he left an indelible mark on my psyche, and on a recent rewatch, I was thrilled to find the film just as powerful and singular as I did all those years ago.
As a queer kid, Summer of Sam particularly resonated with me. The film never uses the word bisexual—almost no film or television show ever does.
That’s part of a pervasive issue of bi-erasure, both within and outside the queer community. Nevertheless, Summer of Sam still clearly telegraphs that Ritchie is in fact bisexual.
He’s obviously smitten with Ruby who quickly becomes his girlfriend while he simultaneously moonlights as a sex worker for male patrons in a queer theater. It was a revelation for me to see a character like that as a teenager.
He never seems particularly confused or ashamed about who he is, except for when he fears for his safety that he’ll be exposed to his homophobic neighbors.
It was a rare depiction of queer life that had its struggles—the climax remains brutal to watch—but also involves a character who doesn’t seem to be judged by the film itself.
Summer of Sam unfortunately wasn’t a hit at the box office, grossing three million dollars less than what it cost to make.
Likewise, it didn’t garner many accolades either; Spike Lee’s films—and Spike Lee himself—have been woefully underrepresented in the awards circuits for years.
Nevertheless, the film remains a fascinating time capsule not only of the 1970s era it represents but also of the late 1990s when offbeat, edgy films made for adult audiences were still given a chance at major studios.
As we endure a summer of our own that breaks those temperature records set in 1977, give Summer of Sam a watch (or a re-watch).
It’s one unique film that’s more than worth your time.
