Mo' Better Blues
| Mo' Better Blues | |
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Theatrical release poster
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| Directed by | Spike Lee |
| Produced by | Spike Lee |
| Written by | Spike Lee |
| Starring | |
| Music by | Bill Lee |
| Cinematography | Ernest Dickerson |
| Edited by | Samuel D. Pollard |
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Production
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| Distributed by | Universal Pictures |
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Release date
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Running time
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129 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $10 million |
| Box office | $16,153,600 (USA) (sub-total) |
| Mo' Better Blues | |
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| Soundtrack album by Branford Marsalis Quartet and Terence Blanchard | |
| Released | 31 July 1990 |
| Genre | Jazz |
| Length | 37:20 |
| Label | Sony Music |
Mo' Better Blues is a 1990 musical drama film starring Denzel Washington, Wesley Snipes, and Spike Lee, who also directed. It follows a period in the life of fictional jazz trumpeter Bleek Gilliam (played by Washington) as a series of bad decisions result in his jeopardizing both his relationships and his playing career. The film focuses on themes of friendship, loyalty, honesty, cause-and-effect, and ultimately salvation. It features the music of the Branford Marsalis quartet and Terence Blanchard on trumpet. The film was released five months after the death of Robin Harris and is dedicated to his memory.
The film begins with a scene set in Brooklyn, New York in 1969. A group of four boys walk up to Bleek Gilliam's brownstone and ask him to come out and play baseball with them. Bleek's mother insists that he continue his trumpet lesson, to his chagrin. His father becomes concerned that Bleek will grow up to be a sissy, and a family argument ensues. In the end, Bleek continues playing his trumpet, and his friends go away.
The next scene brings us to the present (over twenty years later), with an adult Bleek (Denzel Washington) performing on the trumpet at a busy nightclub with his jazz band, The Bleek Quintet (Jeff "Tain" Watts, Wesley Snipes, Giancarlo Esposito and Bill Nunn). Giant (Spike Lee, one of his boyhood friends from the previous scene and current manager of Bleek's band), is waiting in the wings, and advises him to stop allowing his saxophone player Shadow Henderson (Snipes) to grandstand with long solos.
The next morning Bleek wakes up with his girlfriend, Indigo Downes (Joie Lee). She leaves to go to class, while he meets his father by the Brooklyn Bridge for a game of catch, telling him that while he does like Indigo, he likes other women too and is not ready to make a commitment. Later in the day while he is practicing his trumpet, another woman named Clarke Bentancourt (Cynda Williams) visits him. She suggests he fire Giant as his manager; he suggests that they make love (which he refers to as "mo’ better"). She bites his lip and he becomes upset about it, saying, "I make my living with my lips", as he examines the bleeding bottom lip.
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