The Emory Cinematheque Presents: JUNGLE FEVER (1991)

Directed by Spike Lee
1991 | 132 min. | DCP
Introduced by Dr. Mikal Gaines (Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences)
Spike Lee’s JUNGLE FEVER explores interracial coupling (specifically the black-white version of it), the devastation of drug use in Black communities, class status both within and outside of race, and gender roles. The film opens with a tribute to Yusef Hawkins, a young Black teen murdered in 1989.
On August 23, 1989, 16-year-old Hawkins went to look for a used car in the Bensonhurst area of Brooklyn, New York with three of his friends. A mob of about 30 youths approached them, most of them carrying bats. However, one was carrying a gun. This mob of mostly white Italian-Americans were angry because one of their girlfriends invited a Black boy to her eighteenth birthday party. Thinking Hawkins and his friends were there for the party, they beat them with bats and shot Hawkins dead. This real-lived tension undergirds the film.
In praise of JUNGLE FEVER, film critic Alan Bell writes: “Ernest Dickerson’s photography is his best yet” (LOS ANGELES SENTINEL). Film scholar Ed Guerrero argues that “Lee’s inclination for depicting the erotic has produced perhaps the most frank, seductive rendering of interracial, black-on-white sex on the Hollywood screen to date.” While others, like scholar William Lyne, suggest that Spike Lee’s JUNGLE FEVER explores interracial coupling (specifically the black-white version of it), the devastation of drug use in Black communities, class status both within and outside of race, and gender roles. The film opens with a tribute to Yusef Hawkins, a young Black teen murdered in 1989.
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The Emory Cinematheque is a theatrical venue offered by Emory University’s Department of Film and Media. Each semester on Wednesday nights at 7:30pm in White Hall 208, the Cinematheque hosts professional screenings introduced by Emory professors and special guests. All Cinematheque events are free and open to the public. The Cinematheque presents this screening event as part of our series, 40 YEARS OF BROTHER SPIKE LEE, a retrospective of the trailblazing director curated by Emory Professor of Film and Media, Beretta E. Smith-Shomade.