Director Boots Riley hits out at Spike Lee for ‘made up’ BlacKkKlansman

Director Boots Riley has given a sharp critique of Spike Lee’s latest film BlacKkKlansman, claiming the movie based off a black police officer’s account of infiltrating the Ku Klux Klan is actually a ‘made-up story.’

In a three-page essay posted to Twitter Friday, the Sorry to Bother You director criticized the content and timing of the film, writing: ‘It’s a made-up story in which the false parts try to make a cop the protagonist in the fight against racial oppression’.

BlackKklansman is based on the story of Ron Stallworth, a black Colorado detective who infiltrated a chapter of the Ku Klux Klan in the 1970s.

However, in the midst of the Black Lives Matter movement Riley argues that Lee’s film changed historical events to portray police officers as heroes fighting racism, even though he claims the real-life Ron Stallworth is the ‘villain’.

Sorry to Bother You director Boots Riley wrote a three-page essay critiquing Spike Lee's latest film BlacKkKlansman

Sorry to Bother You director Boots Riley wrote a three-page essay critiquing Spike Lee’s latest film BlacKkKlansman

The movie is based on the true story of a black Colorado detective who infiltrated a chapter of the Ku Klux Klan in the 1970s, but Riley claims many of the plot points were fabricated to depict cops as the heroes 'in the fight against racial oppression'

The movie is based on the true story of a black Colorado detective who infiltrated a chapter of the Ku Klux Klan in the 1970s, but Riley claims many of the plot points were fabricated to depict cops as the heroes ‘in the fight against racial oppression’

Riley began his essay with praise for Spike Lee, saying the director ‘has been a huge influence on me’ and is ‘the reason I went to film school so many years ago.’

But he also notes that like Lee, he too is an outspoken critic who won’t ‘hold my tongue’. 

In BlaKkKlansman, Stallworth, played by John David Washington, prevents a bomb going off at a civil rights ally, subsequently making him the hero. 

Riley claims that event and many others in the film are fabricated plot points to showcase the police in a positive light. 

‘To the extent that people of color deal with actual physical attacks and terrorizing due to racism and racist doctrines – we deal with it mostly from the police on a day to day basis. And not just from White cops. From Black cops too,’ he wrote. 

‘So for Spike to come out with a movie where a story points are fabricated in order make Black cop and his counterparts look like allies in the fight against racism is really disappointing, to put it very mildly.’

The film is based off Stallworth’s memoir of the same title, which Riley says furthers his point that it was written to portray the officer in the best light.  

Riley claims the protagonist Stallworth is actually the 'villain' who worked against radical black anti-oppression groups

Riley claims the protagonist Stallworth is actually the ‘villain’ who worked against radical black anti-oppression groups

Riley also claims that Stallworth’s undercover operation was part of COINTELPRO, an FBI program that disrupted radical groups fighting racism. 

He says that with this program Stallworth worked against black causes and ‘infiltrated a Black radical organization for three years’ to ‘sabotage’ a group who stood against racist oppression, citing the Freedom of Information Act. 

‘Without the made up stuff and with what we know of the actual history of police infiltration into radical groups, and how they infiltrated and directed White Supremacist organizations to attack those groups, Ron Stallworth is the villain,’ Riley writes.  

He says BlackKklansman reinforces the misguided argument that black-on-black crime is the issue and not police brutality, citing Lee’s 2016 film Chiraq that depicted gun violence in Chicago. 

Riley finishes the essay by pointing out that the New York Police department paid Lee – one of its most outspoken critics – $200,000 by to help launch an advertising campaign to improve their image and relations with minority communities. 

‘Whether it actually is or not, Blackkklansman feels like an extension of that ad campaign,’ he concludes. 

Read Riley’s entire critique below:  

 



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