Dropping It... Non-Fiction Style.

John Kass, Chicago Tribune: 

"Chi-Raq" is not a perfect film. Still, I liked it. And I'd pay to see it again

I liked Spike Lee's new movie "Chi-Raq," the story about the gang wars and all the lives lost in the war zone that is Chicago. The politicians and Mayor Rahm Emanuel won't like it. But that's OK.

After it was over, I thought there was one more thing Lee could do for Chicago. He should sell his Knicks courtside seats, forget New York for a while and stick around here to watch the mayor remove the political stones from his shoe in a heater case.Because a new film  -- actually a video -- premieres in a day or two. And this one is nothing like "Chi-Raq."

This one is a silent video from a police dash cam. It is said to depict a Chicago cop pumping 16 rounds into 17-year-old Laquan McDonald, a young man stretched on the pavement, twitching as the bullets enter his body.

So in the video, unlike "Chi-Raq" there is no music or dancing, no phallic references or thrusting hips. No beautiful women denying sexual favors to gangbangers until the mean boys drop their guns and stop the killing and become men.

I couldn't help wonder what Lee might do with the McDonald story: white cop emptying his gun, black kid with a knife and PCP in his system, activists primed, City Hall making with the intrigue, Cook County politicians playing the game and creaky old Rev. Jesse Jackson in the wings.

Coming soon, to a neighborhood near you...