4 Little Girls

There is mostly sadness and regret at the surface in 4 Little Girls, but there is anger in the depths, as there should be. Read full review

4 Little Girls brilliantly captures a moment in American history and tells an achingly painful story of injustice and family loss. Read full review

The film's approach is highly instructive, deeply moving, and geared to deploring the racism that breeds violence rather than reactivating old hatreds. Read full review

Director Spike Lee has made some of the most hard-edged and unsettling American films on racism and its effects. Yet none has been as moving as this. [24 Oct 1997, Pg.F2]

This subject demands consummate screen treatment and now has absolutely gotten it from director/producer Spike Lee. [10 Jul 1997, Pg.02.D]

Spike Lee's first feature-length documentary is an uncharacteristically restrained effort by this major filmmaker, lacking the intense style and outlandishness of much of his earlier work. But it tells a powerful story simply and movingly and thus serves as an important cinematic document of one of the most heinous crimes of the civil rights era: the 1963 Birmingham, Ala., church bombing that resulted in the deaths of four young children. [11 July 1997]

An important act of historical preservation, a focused and effective film that brings back a dark, important moment in history with startling clarity. Read full review

Lee takes a conventional, talking-heads-and-archival-clips approach to the material, but rewardingly establishes an intimate connection with his subjects by devoting considerable time to the personalities and families of the four victims. Read full review

It is Lee's job as a film maker to imbue these images with life, and that's a task he easily accomplishes. Read full review

Surprisingly, given Lee's penchant for experimentation, there's nothing remotely innovative about this sober, often intensely moving exploration of a community's lingering grief and outrage -- just the usual talking heads, stock footage, montages of stills, and such. Read full review

Mr. Lee, whose lean, straightforward documentary style loses none of his usual clarity and fire (the film has been exceptionally well shot by Ellen Kuras), summons a powerful sense of Birmingham's past and a galvanizing sense of how this bombing would change its future. Read full review

There isn't an ounce of flab or hype, and the story it tells is profoundly affecting. Read full review

The film is artfully made, its occasional excesses of style moderated by the plain force of the content and the passion of the testimony. Read full review

The movie is strongest when Lee keeps his eye on the prize: the experiences of ordinary people in an extraordinary time. Read full review

Lee occasionally stumbles as a documentarian... But the material is so profoundly moving that it hardly matters. Read full review

Lee's tough decision to include photos of the victims' smashed-up bodies was probably correct, but adding 'soulful' music to some of the interviews was more questionable. Read full review