Review: 'Kobe Doin' Work'

Kobe Doin’ Work is worthless. You do not get anything out of it more than watching the regular broadcast. It is the type of movie that only makes me think about how it could have been better: Why Kobe? Yes, he’s a great player – the MVP last year. But, he is such a boring, filtered guy. He is always aware of his situation. You are not going learn anything about his personality from a fairly meaningless (the #1 seed, I guess, was on the line) game at the end of the regular season.

Director Spike Lee and his longtime cinematographer Matthew Libatique set up 30 cameras during the April 13th, 2008 Lakers/Spurs game (Of course, Scoop Jackson got that widely publicized fact totally wrong. He writes the shoot took place “last May for one Lakers playoff game against the Spurs.” In his defense, it is well-documented that Scoop Jackson is terrible at his job (To be fair, that is not entirely Jackson’s fault. He probably had not seen the movie yet. But how did his editor let that slip through?).). Most of the cameras focus on Bryant throughout the game. The others are used to show the setting (wide shots from the ceiling of the arena, shots of Kobe’s daughters in the stands). Lee said he was inspired to make this by Zidane: A 21st Century Portrait, which focused on French soccer star Zinedine Zidane during one game.

The game action is given context through the occasional mix of the ESPN broadcast and a taping of Bryant doing essentially an audio commentary (that taping took place just after Bryant scored 61 points on Spike Lee’s beloved New York Knicks). Bryant stays, not surprisingly, safe with everything he says. He speaks gushingly about Phil Jackson and his teammates. The only time he comes close to being animated is when he gets on himself, calling himself an “idiot” a few times.

The best of those moments occurs just prior to halftime. Bryant has to do the silly halftime interview with ESPN's Michelle Tafoya. He's sweating and giving the usual bland, uncontroversial, uninteresting, answers. In his commentary, Bryant reveals that all he really wants to do at that point is sit down. He says, “I look like an idiot.” He thinks he is just making fun of himself, but he also is pointing out the stupidity of all sideline-type interviews. They are always awful. Stop doing them.

In the end, this Spike Lee Joint is just boring. Yeah, it’s funny when Kobe gives advice to Luke Walton and Walton sounds shocked that Kobe even knows his name, but there really is nothing noteworthy about Kobe Doin’ Work. It just exists.

(PS: Go Magic!!)