Audacious, vibrant, unsurprisingly maligned but frequently brilliant.

Full Review | Mar 23, 2020

Spike Lee's sharp, riotous satire, from 2000, zeroes in on the grotesque misrepresentation of blacks in American media-and their underrepresentation in the corporate offices that control it.

Full Review | Oct 26, 2015

Provocative Spike Lee movie for older teens.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Sep 23, 2010

This is basically sloppy, all-over-the-map filmmaking with few hints of self-criticism and few genuine laughs.

Full Review | Sep 23, 2008

If Mr. Lee meant to bring back blackface entertainment as a metaphor for the current black performers he finds obnoxious, he has miscalculated.

Full Review | Apr 27, 2007

Lee's satire on American TV is an intriguing failure.

Full Review | Jan 26, 2006

It is an inspired but difficult film that poses many questions and takes almost everyone to task, yet offers few suggestions as to what is to be done with this infamous legacy.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/5 | Jun 5, 2002

At his best, Spike Lee is too brave to be subtle.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/4 | Mar 19, 2002

You won't look at race onscreen the same way again.

Full Review | Jun 4, 2001

Yes, Bamboozled is a picture of genuine importance. Yes, it is also crude, unstable and hazardous.

Full Review | May 30, 2001

The mix of comedy and hard-hitting outrage sits uneasily, and two-dimensional characters and performances (Wayans and Rapaport spring to mind, though Pinkett delivers a rigorous integrity) are further impediments as the film increases in hysteria.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/5 | Apr 16, 2001

The question of where ethnic comedy stops and cruel stereotype begins also gets lost as the cast improv well beyond any given scene's point, and it can all end only with a contrived last act of kidnappings and shoot-outs with the cops.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/5 | Apr 9, 2001

Goes too far in the wrong direction and not far enough where you want it to.

Full Review | Jan 1, 2000

Visually drab and ultimately done in by a heavy- handedness no prettier to ponder.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/4 | Jan 1, 2000

The shortfall in Bamboozled stems from Lee trying to encompass too much, with too many subplots and a far from optimum choice of targets.

Full Review | Jan 1, 2000

Poor Mantan Moreland and Hattie McDaniel and all the rest are made to take the rap in this movie for contributing to a legacy of racist degradation. One would think, given what they were up against, that a bit more sympathy might be shown to these people.

Full Review | Jan 1, 2000

It's a movie that both entertains and provokes -- would we expect anything less from Spike Lee?

Full Review | Jan 1, 2000

Bamboozled is startling and uncomfortable.

Full Review | Jan 1, 2000

Bamboozled may not be the year's best movie, but it's undoubtedly the most important.

Full Review | Jan 1, 2000

Glover is remarkable. His performances are fiery and charismatic, and the internal conflicts he brings to the blackface act are visible both in his acting and dancing performances.

Full Review | Jan 1, 2000