Highest 2 Lowest (Apple TV+)

Highest 2 Lowest is, on paper, a big movie. A remake of Kurosawa’s High and Low, a $25 million project with a cast that looks like a Billboard lineup: Denzel, A$AP Rocky, Ice Spice, Princess Nokia.

On paper.

In practice, the film feels more like a prestige project that’s been run straight through a TikTok filter and served with corny violins in the background. 90% of the film is scored with what I can only describe as “Days of Our Lives” music with attitude. It’s as if every scene has to feel important, even when someone is just taking a sip of coffee. Handshakes and high-fives are repeated in slow motion, as if Spike Lee wants to make absolutely sure we catch the symbolism.

We do, Spike. We catch it. Twice.

The film reimagines Kurosawa’s classic tale of morality and class divide, but moves the action to present-day New York. Denzel Washington plays King Giddens, a former music mogul whose son and godson are kidnapped by A$AP Rocky’s character — a rival rapper who wants revenge on the system, or maybe just to sell streams. But the kidnapping itself, and the tension around it, is over in what feels like two minutes. Instead of nerve-shredding drama, we get a music video disguised as a plot, with one of the victims sitting in a bathtub while a rap song plays in the background. It’s laid on so thick that for a second you’re in no doubt that you’re supposed to listen to the track and ignore everything happening on screen.

Jeffrey Wright, who plays Giddens’ loyal fixer Malik, delivers a fabulous performance without really having anything to work with. His character is a former convicted criminal, now converted to Islam — and the film makes absolutely sure we don’t miss that detail. Prayers, recitations, repetitions. It’s all played with a seriousness that, on paper, should move you, but instead ends up feeling like an educational module for hungover high school students. Wright does his best — he has presence, force and a calm that almost creates balance — but even he becomes a caricature in a universe that insists on shouting instead of telling.

There are moments when the film tries to be something else. When Denzel sits alone in a car, the darkness closing in, shadowboxing with a face you almost believe. But then — cut — A$AP Rocky in a rap sequence with a moral that could have been lifted straight out of Sesame Street. I’d like to say it’s satire. But it feels more like an unfortunate attempt at satire.

At one point I genuinely thought the film was a modern take on A Christmas Carol. It looks like a Christmas movie without snow, but with everything else: rebirth, forgiveness and an evil white man representing the system. Because in Highest 2 Lowest, there’s not much doubt about who the villain is. He’s white, well dressed, and says things like “All these new rappers sound the same to me.”

Ironically, that’s the most believable moment in the entire film.

The biggest problem isn’t even the idea. It’s the execution itself — as if your dad directed a film about American hip-hop culture after watching three episodes of Empire and hearing HUMBLE. once. Caricatured. Overproduced. And in a strange way, deeply fascinating. Because you can feel the ambition. There is definitely a better film lying on the cutting-room floor. Denzel still performs as if he’s already won an Oscar for this, and that’s exactly what makes it painful to watch: he believes in it.

At one point the film tries to talk about finding its rhythm — ironically, exactly what it loses itself. It wants to be The Wire, but ends up as Empire. It wants to be 8 Mile, but feels like Pitch Perfect 3. And it’s hard not to sit there thinking that Spike Lee may have made his own meta-commentary — just without realising it himself. I don’t know whether all of this is intentional. Whether Spike Lee is trying to show how American culture tells itself through stereotypes. Or whether he’s simply lost control of his own soundtrack. But I’m pretty sure the editor still wakes up at night, drenched in sweat, thinking: “Should I have cut that rap battle scene?”

It’s hard not to smile — and at the same time sigh. Because Highest 2 Lowest wants so badly to be something huge, but ends up as a film trying to high-five its own reflection. And doing it twice.

Afterthought:

The most fascinating thing about Highest 2 Lowest is how sincerely it wants to say something about class, faith and music — yet ends up becoming a mirror of everything it tries to criticise. It wants to be raw and real, but everything feels choreographed. It wants to present hip-hop as the soul of the people, but uses it as scenery. And maybe that’s exactly what makes the film so American at its core: the need to tell the story of the underclass with a $25 million camera. Spike Lee still has something on his mind — but it’s as if he doesn’t trust us to hear it unless there are strings and bass under every single word.