I thought my favorite film of 2025 was One Battle After Another. It makes sense for me considering the film is a meditation on left wing politics in America, however imperfect it may be. I’ve written about the brilliance of the film and the ignorance of the critics elsewhere.

However, then, I watched Highest 2 Lowest. I am conflicted, while as I believe the film is by no means perfect, Highest 2 Lowest succeeds as a work of art primarily in how it tackles the complicated nature of race and class in 21^st century New York City, in the third decade. This is a rare and mostly unnoticed feat. It features a phenomenal performance by one of my favorite actors, Jeffrey Wright as Paul, Denzel’s driver. Paul is going to be the main focus of my review. I think Paul is a relatively unique character in a modern survey of Black film. I’ve written previously before for the Metropolitan Review about how contemporary African-American literature and art fails to deal with the conditions faced by the Black working classes. In some ways, there is no better place to set a movie about the contradictions of the Black bourgeois and the Black proletariat than a place like New York City, as the contradictions are the most clear there.

New York City has gentrified dozens of times over. Despite that, in many ways, the film is a celebration of the city as it exists now. Throughout the film as you watch, it’s very clear that this is New York in 2025. It is not a nostalgia trip. One of my favorite scenes was the Puerto Rican Day Parade which reminds us that not all of the culture has been erased from New York City just yet. A picture dealing with this new version of New York reminded me of a film I saw last year at Black Star Festival in Philadelphia called Love, Brooklyn, which grapples with the changing demographics and class character of the city from the perspective of an aging Black journalist in Brooklyn. In many ways, Spike is an artifact from the past era of Black working class Brooklyn which seems to be a memory.

Predictably, the film follows David King (nicknamed King David), played by Denzel Washington, a member of the Black noveau riche. Even more unsurprisingly, his money has come from working in the music business. He lives in a high rise penthouse in downtown Brooklyn, a hallmark of the Black bourgeoisie. I think about Jay Z’s lyrics and his overall story from his song “The Story of OJ,”

I coulda bought a place in Dumbo before it was Dumbo
For like 2 million
That same building today is worth 25 million
Guess how I’m feeling? Dumbo

It is still Jay-Z’s Brooklyn but transformed. In many way, David is a stand-in for a Jay-Z. King David’s penthouse is filled with work by famous Black artists such as Jean Basquiat and Kerry James Marshall. One of my favorite elements of the film was the use of the art and other cultural artifacts such as the Toni Morrison first editions of Sula shown at the end of the film that signify the class politics. The movie is dripping with the aesthetics of the Black bourgeoisie. They even mention that King David owns a home in Sag Harbor, clearly an effort by his character to enter into the historic Black bourgeois.

Paul was my favorite character, as he represents the remnant of the Black working class in New York City. Paul’s identity also feels intentionally different than King David and his family’s. We see a shot of Paul’s office or room in David’s house which has a photo of Malcolm X and a Five Percenter poster. Paul is an ex-con and a Muslim who is suspected of being implicated in the kidnapping. But then, as it turns out, his son Kyle has been kidnapped instead. Paul faces countless indignities in this film which serve to illustrate the poor condition faced by the black proletariat in a city of glass like New York City. From the first time we see him in the film, Paul asks his boss David if he can say goodbye to his son Kyle at basketball practice. He is promptly told no by David, despite the fact that David says goodbye to his own son Trey. The whole film in regards to Paul as a character is frankly hard to watch. When it’s revealed that Paul’s son Kyle is kidnapped instead of Trey, he begs David for a loan of 17.5 million to pay the ransom so his son is not killed. He says something like “I’ll pay you back,” or another pitiful phrase along those lines.

The tragedy of that moment reminded me of Stringer Bell stealing the badminton set in The Wire or when Ki-woo commits to making enough money to buy the house that his dad is trapped within in Parasite. We all know about the tragedies and impossible situations that poverty traps people in especially the Black working classes. Paul is no exception. In the film, Paul is constantly harassed and suspected by the NYPD in the midst of the investigation into the kidnapping before it’s revealed his son has been kidnapped. Paul is treated poorly by all of the cops despite the fact that many of the investigators are Black and Latino cops. Wright really acts his ass off. One of the most difficult moments to watch is where Paul asks the officers repeatedly if he is “being detained.” Paul is a man who has been clearly traumatized by the war on crime and mass incarceration that peaked in NY in the late 90s/early 2000s. You can see it in his face. Spike understands NYC. When he is finally reunited with his son, Paul pleads with the police to allow him to have a moment alone. He contrasts with his son’s treatment by the NYPD with Trey’s treatment. The fact that there is double standard with how the police treat Black boys dependent on their class is something that is often missed in the race writing that seems so popular these days.

Paul’s Islam and Black nationalism, while they are subtle signifiers, spoke particularly to me, as they are the remnants of the 20^th century’s Black radical politics that have remained in the Black working classes as culture. In contrast, David’s family home is adorned with Kamala Harris posters and the Black art that I mentioned earlier. In some ways, Paul’s faith plays in his contrast with a younger version of him that is represented in Rocky’s character Young Felon. Young Felon, in contrast to Paul, is a complete nihilist who begs King David to kill him on the subway in the final confrontation of the film. The reality is that the young Black proletarians have even less hope than Black men from Paul’s generation, they are completely lost in a desire for TikTok hype as opposed to the Black nationalism of the 20^th century. I was reminded of Idris Robinson’s text “On Black Leadership and Other White Myths”,

It is worthwhile to note that black people, ourselves, never refer to any mythical black leadership. This is because we know, full and well, that all of our leaders, since Martin and Malcolm, have been killed. Even our potential leaders, like Trayvon and Tamir, are gunned down before they can share with us their vision. What’s more, if they are not brutally murdered, then they are locked away forever with Sundiata, Mutulu, and Mumia. That is, we know that if you speak with truth and move against oppression, then the only way to avoid the pig’s bullet or penitentiary, the modern-day cracker’s whip or plantation, is to go on the run like Assata Olugbala Shakur!

Idris Robinson captures the sad conditions faced by young Black people well in this quote. Young Felon embodies the understandable nihilism that seems present in much of the Black proletariat in the wake of the Black movement’s destruction in the 20^th century. Young Felon is also revealed to be a super fan of King David who envies his penthouse in the sky in Brooklyn. In some ways, this represented, at least to me, how Black celebrity has completely replaced the Black political leader. Instead of Malcolm X, there’s Kendrick Lamar. Instead of Kwame Ture, there’s Kai Cenat. It’s a horrific reality indeed. The Black Panthers, the Republic of New Afrika and any Black groups that could have offered young Black people hope are mostly gone. Instead, they are replaced by trend chasing Black activists, which Spike seemingly critiques a bit at the end of the film. My friend Ben Passmore’s graphic novel Black Arms to Hold You Up deals with this sad reality for Black social movements in the current moment we are in, as I’ve written about before.

To be clear, the film is by no means radical in it’s approach to the characters or the plot. The film celebrates the Black business acumen of King David, even if he faced with the encroaching horrors of AI. The ending seems to serve as a critique of modern hip hop that definitely shows Spike’s age. Finally, when Young Felon is brought into the courthouse, there are thousands of people outside of the courtroom yelling “Free him,” which seems to be a not so sly critique of the social justice movements of the past fifteen or so years. Spike seems to be saying that people are less interested in a real cause and more-so in chasing trends. While this is partially true, takes like these always rub me the wrong way as I feel they invalidate and collapses the past fifteen years of Black struggle into trend chasing, which diminishes the sacrifices of participants who faced death and prison for their participation in various uprising. I think a lot about the various Black men and allies who were killed in the wake of the Ferguson rebellion.

Despite this, Paul’s story ends tragically. While David does ultimately decided to pay the ransom so Kyle is not killed, it seems that it mostly happens cynically because Trey is getting roasted on Black Twitter. David’s financial sacrifice leads to success for his reputation and his record label. Eventually, Paul uses his street connections to find Young Felon after David’s money goes missing during a handoff in the best scene in the film. Paul and David return to their old hood. David manages to get the money back from Young Felon but Paul is injured in the attempt. As Paul sits in the hospital, he has been blinded by glass flying into his eye, and he tells David he is no longer going to work for him. David jokingly calls him “cyclops” earlier so the indignities only continue. Finally, Paul turns away with a tired look on his face as David tells him to “Stay Black.” This part only serves, at least to me, to highlight how different Black experience can be, as it calls back to Paul’s frustration with the police’s treatment of his son. The sad thing is that Paul constantly thanks David throughout the story for giving him the opportunities for work. He is so grateful for David, referring to him as “beloved.” Finding work as an ex-con is difficult so Paul through sacrificing his job with David is throwing himself into a world of uncertainty and perhaps immiseration.

I have been writing a lot about film these days. Literature will always be my main thing, but I’ve enjoyed writing about film, as it often is more able to explore some of the topics I am interested in. I don’t think Spike Lee or Alan Fox (who wrote the film) were looking to make something about the Black proletariat when they made Highest 2 Lowest. Despite this, Highest 2 Lowest is a film in way that has to do with class and Black people in 21^st century New York City. Happy accidents do occur. I think many of the conclusions in the film are conservative ultimately (essay for another time) but the film does show, at least in my view, a deep empathy for the Black proletariat in a city like New York. It is unsure and predictably corny in other ways, but I was surprised on how much I enjoyed it.