Muddled remake: Denzel Washington can’t salvage Spike Lee’s surprisingly scattered ‘Highest 2 Lowest’

Denzel Washington and director Spike Lee have had a great partnership through the years—including Malcolm X, still one of the greatest biopics ever made. Sadly, their fifth pairing proves to be their weakest.

While New York City has never looked more beautiful than it does in Highest 2 Lowest, stunningly shot by cinematographer Matthew Libatique, the film never finds a rhythm. Despite a good performance by Washington, and some of the standard stylistic touches of Lee on full display, the movie is all over the place.

In this remake of Akira Kurosawa’s High and Low, Washington plays David King, a music mogul looking to buy back his label amidst a company shakeup. Just when he has the financing to make the big, risky deal, Kyle (Elijah Wright), the son of David’s chauffer, Paul (Jeffrey Wright, real-life dad of Elijah), is kidnapped—by mistake, instead of David’s own son, Trey (Aubrey Joseph). I think I wrote that in a way that makes sense. If not, editors please have at it.

David is faced with the moral and fiscal dilemmas of having to give up his life savings, and essentially his career, to save the life of Kyle. In the meantime, some crusty New York City detectives work to find the kidnapper, who calls David often and clearly has some sort of grudge against the man.

The mystery isn’t all that mysterious, and the kidnapping plot is more or less a background for a film primarily about familial bonds, and the rigors of running a business in a world run by social media.

The first half of the movie is a murky slog, hindered by an obstructive soundtrack composed by Howard Drossin. The music is beautiful, but it belongs in another movie. Rather than creating tension or accentuating the film’s attempts at emotional depth, it offers an oblivious, tone-deaf, happy vibe. It simply doesn’t fit.

The second half of the film is a little better as David leaves his sweet penthouse apartment and goes out into the streets for a ransom drop. His train ride is memorable, with Lee mainstay Nicholas Turturro showing up as a revved-up Yankee fan, and Rosie Perez appearing as herself at a city festival. This is where Highest 2 Lowest has a decent pulse. But the finale is simplistically silly—after the film hints at going to some invitingly strange places.

Spike Lee has made some of the greatest American movies of the past 40 years, so it’s always a supreme bummer when one of his movies comes up a bit short. Before missing with this one, he’d been on a great run over the last decade with the likes of Da 5 Bloods, David Byrne’s American Utopia, BlacKkKlansman and Chi-Raq.

Washington is typically good as David, navigating all of the script’s disjointedness, and modulating his performance to all the fits and starts. As hard as he tries, he can’t formulate a complete character that makes sense, due to the film’s shortcomings. Most of the performances around him are either too stiff or overwrought, leaving Washington on a sort of cinematic island.

A$AP Rocky turns in perhaps the film’s second-best performance, appearing late in the film as an up-and-coming artist. His performance gives the film an unhinged, unpredictable edge; it could have used a lot more of that.

Highest 2 Lowest falls somewhere in the middle of a ranking of Lee’s films. It’s not good enough to count among his successes, but it’s better than a couple of his true misfires.

He will rise again—and hopefully find an excuse to work with Washington at least one more time before the actor delivers on his promise to retire soon.

Highest 2 Lowest is now streaming on Apple TV+.