History Film / DoTheRightThing

* BatterUp: Sal keeps a baseball bat behind the counter of his pizza joint and uses it to smash Radio Raheem's boombox. [[BerserkButton Radio doesn't take it well]].

* {{Hypocrite}}: Buggin' Out accuses Sal of being racist for featuring famous Italian Americans on the wall of his Italian Pizzaria, then later verbally assaults a white bicycler, saying that he doesn't have any right to live or be in a black neighborhood, all because the cycler got dirt on Buggin's shoes. [[spoiler: It's also worth pointing out that in the final argument, Sal began to use the N-word only after Buggin' Out called him a "Guinea bastard" first]].

* EveryoneHasStandards: Sal ''might'' be a racist, but any prejudice he has is nowhere close to the outfight bigotry of his son Pino, who he admonishes for this.

* NotSoDifferent: Mookie invokes this in his conversation with the bigoted Pino around the middle of the film, pointing out that many of Pino's favorite celebrities are Black, and that as a "dark Italian", his hair is even kinkier than Mookie's.

* RippedFromTheHeadlines: This film was inspired by an actual incident in the city where some black youths were chased out of a pizzeria by some white youths in a section of the city known as Howard Beach.

* TitleDrop: Da Mayor advises Mookie to "always do the right thing."

* {{Epigraph}}: The film ends with two quotes to underline the conflict of the movie: one by Martin Luther King Jr, arguing that violence is never justified, and one by Malcolm X arguing that violence in self-defense is justified.

* AMFMCharacterization: Radio Raheem walks around with a boombox blaring out Music/PublicEnemy's "Fight the Power".

* GreekChorus: Senor Love Daddy and the three men sitting across from the Korean grocer (Coconut Sid, Sweet Dick Willie, and ML respectively).

-->'''Punchy:''' Black Panther eat pizza, we eat pizza.

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Mookie (Spike Lee) is a delivery man for Sal (Creator/DannyAiello), the Italian-American owner of a pizza joint in [[BigApplesauce Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn]]. One hot summer day, a friend of Mookie's, Buggin' Out (Creator/GiancarloEsposito), notices that Sal's "Wall of Fame" has only Italian celebrities. Irritated, Buggin' Out argues that Sal should put some black celebrities on the wall, since most of his customers are black. Equally irritated, Sal argues that it's his restaurant and he can decorate it how he likes.

Mookie (Spike Lee) is a delivery man for Sal (Creator/DannyAiello), the Italian-American owner of a Brooklyn pizza joint. One hot summer day, a friend of Mookie's, Buggin' Out (Creator/GiancarloEsposito), notices that Sal's "Wall of Fame" has only Italian celebrities. Irritated, Buggin' Out argues that Sal should put some black celebrities on the wall, since most of his customers are black. Equally irritated, Sal argues that it's his restaurant and he can decorate it how he likes.

A 1989 Creator/SpikeLee [[InsistentTerminology joint]] about bigotry and racism. Often considered one of Lee's signature films, it's known as much for its content and ever-relevant themes as it is for its initial controversial reception among audiences and for being [[AwardSnub snubbed]] in favor of ''Film/DrivingMissDaisy'' at the Oscars.

A 1989 Creator/SpikeLee [[InsistentTerminology joint]] about bigotry and racism. Often considered one of Lee's signature films, it's known as much for its content and ever-relevant themes as it is for its initial controversial reception among audiences and for being [[AwardSnub snubbed]] by ''Film/DrivingMissDaisy'' at the Oscars.

* HeatWave: The film takes place during the biggest one of the year, and the rising temperature is frequently used as a metaphor for the rising tensions between the various racial groups of the neighborhood. The heat remains an InformedAttribute though as nothing besides newspaper headlines, character comments and rotating fans makes you feel they really experience 99°F (37°C) out there in the streets.

* AngryDance: Tina's dance in the opening scene. The sequence is obviously meant to illustrate the anger in the community, the theme of "fighting" in the song, and the racially-motivated hatred on all sides in the neighborhood.

It's a small argument over a minor issue. It shouldn't be a big deal. But today is the hottest day of the summer. And sooner or later, that unbearable heat is going to bring the racial tension in this neighborhood to a violent and quite literal boiling point...

Mookie (Spike Lee) is a delivery man for Sal (Creator/DannyAiello), the Italian-American owner of a Brooklyn pizza joint. One hot summer day, a friend of Mookie's, Buggin' Out (Creator/GiancarloEsposito) notices that Sal's "Wall of Fame" has only Italian celebrities. Irritated, Buggin' Out argues that Sal should put some black celebrities on the wall, since most of his customers are black. Equally irritated, Sal argues that it's his restaurant and he can decorate it how he likes.

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* YankTheDogsChain: Right as Sal, the old man who's one of the few genuinely kind people, is about to let in some customers even though he's closed, because he just loves his community, [[spoiler:a riot breaks out ending up with Sal being attacked on the street, Radio Raheem dead, the pizzeria that he built and ran all his life looted and burnt to the ground,]] all by the people who he just moments ago happily mentioned grew up on his pizza.

* VagueAge: Radio Raheem, played by Bill Nunn in his mid thirties, is clearly supposed to be a young man, but it's unclear whether he's supposed to be a teenager or something close to it.

* TheBigRottenApple: The film depicts a late 80s Brooklyn neighborhood as a racially charged tinderbox ready to explode.

* DisproportionateRetribution: [[spoiler: Raheem being murdered in cold blood by the NYPD officer for his assault on Sal]].

* HoodFilm: The film is often seen as the GenrePopularizer. In an UnbuiltTrope, it's set in New York instead of the more popular California and features white protagonists as well as black ones. The film is about racial tensions in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn--namely between African-American and Italian-American communities, and how far they can end up escalating.

* PoliceAreUseless: An Italian guy's car is soaked by some black kids messing with a fire hydrant. What do New York's finest do? Put the cap back on the hydrant, mock the guy's attempts to make a report for vandalization, and suggest he take off before the locals decide to strip his car clean.

* RippedFromTheHeadlines: This film was inspired by an actual incident in New York where some black youths were chased out of a pizzeria by some white youths in a section of New York known as Howard Beach.
* SacrificialLion: [[spoiler: Radio Raheem. His death by the Police's hands leaves the entire block devastated, and leads Mookie to smash the window to Sal's pizzeria. Everyone soon joins in, tearing down the establishment while chanting Raheem's name.]]

* {{Hypocrite}}: Buggin' Out accuses Sal of being racist for featuring famous Italian Americans on the wall of his Italian Pizzaria, then later verbally assaults a white bicycler, saying that he doesn't have any right to live or be in a black neighborhood, all because the cycler got dirt on Buggin's shoes.

** Mookie, who [[spoiler: seemingly suffers no punishment for starting the riot that led to the destruction of Sal's Famous. However, considering that unless Sal reconciles with him, Mookie has only 500 dollars to spend wisely for his family now that he's without a job, so it's still hard to call the end of his story a happy one.]]