Working from a Richard Price novel with the same name, Spike Lee’s Clockers appears to be the proper antecedent to The Wire, which Price had a hand in as well. As with any adaptation, it’d be difficult to aptly compare the film and the book seeing as each is housed within the realm of its own form. A book is not the same thing as a film and vice versa.

Getting that out of the way, Spike Lee again takes time to illuminate a culturally significant issue just during the opening credit sequence. In past filmic efforts, there’s been dancing, playing in the street and even a bit of flag burning. But in the 1995 Clockers, Lee displays countless images of bodies strewn about on the street. Each is black and covered in blood. Of course, the drug game doesn’t only impact the lives of people living in major cities or in the black community, but that’s Lee’s focus.

As with any of Lee’s films, the vast majority of the cast and screen time is given over to black faces. The most frequent interlopers, though, are Harvey Keitel and John Turturro. As the title sequence subsides and viewers are brought into the world of these particular projects, the film displays a bevy of cops circling a dead body. There’s no mirth inherent, but a jocular attitude is levied on a situation that really demands the utmost seriousness.

It’s at once a commentary on the police’s relation to the black community as well as the ability to become desensitized to violence. There’s no way that people in any community are going to be as frequently exposed to scenes such as the one depicted here, but still, the projects – rife with dealers and addicts – allow for too great a familiarity with death.

It’s odd that Lee here shows the cops – a few at least – to be decent guys. The Keitel character, Det. Rocco Klein, is an average one for the veteran actor, but is rendered in casual terms, but all knowing ones. It’s rare for cops in movies like this to be portrayed in such a light, but if anyone can pull it off, it’s Keitel.

His drug world foil, Strike as played by Mekhi Phifer, sports an illness that Lee will again make use of in subsequent films: stomach problems. It’s obviously meant to denote some problem apart from the physical, but the director doesn’t ever make explicit what.