Spike Lee Angered over Eastwood War Films

At the Cannes film festival Spike Lee bashed Clint Eastwood for not portraying black soldiers in his films Flags of Our Fathers, and Letters From Iwo Jima. " There were many African-Americans who survived that war and who were upset at Clint for not having one [in the films]. That was his version: the negro soldier did not exist. I have a different version," Mr. Lee said at a press conference to promote his own war film Miracle at St. Anna. Mr. Lee claimed that Mr. Eastwood was apprised of the fact that black soldiers were involved in the battle of Iwo Jima. So what is Mr. Lee's purpose in lashing out at Mr. Eastwood for what may or may not have been an oversight? When I'm watching a film, I'm usually too engrossed in the story line to be counting the number of ethnic races represented in the film. I would have to ask what Mr. Lee would like to see done to ensure that this never happens in Hollywood again, perhaps some sort of "Affirmative Action" rule that mandates that a certain percentage of ethnic races to be represented when filming? So much for creative freedom. In my opinion Mr. Lee has taken a small error and magnified it out of all proportion. Even if it wasn't an error it's still Mr. Eastwoods film, and if he wants to exclude that portion from his film, then he can. Mr. Lee has his own movie coming out about the all black members of the 92^nd Buffalo Division, and should Mr. Lee decided to exclude any white soldiers in his film, then he too has a right to do just that. What strikes me as curious is the timing that Spike Lee choose to reprimand Clint Eastwood. Both of Eastwoods films came out in 2006 and 2007 respectively. That means Mr. Lee had almost two full years to voice his opposition to how Eastwood made his films. So why did Spike Lee wait until the 2008 Cannes film festival with all the worlds media in attendance to denounce Clint Eastwoods movies? I believe the timing was a deliberate attempt by Spike Lee to gain maximum exposure for his film by insinuating that Clint Eastwood is racist for not having any black soldiers in his cast.