Miracle at St. Anna

What is the Miracle at St. Anna? Maybe that a filmmaker capable of the eloquence of When the Levees Broke could make such an incoherent movie. Or maybe it’s the recollection of an incident by means of a flashback within a flashback within a flashback when none of those having the flashbacks could have had any of the experiences recalled. The proceedings begin in 1983, with Hector (Laz Alonso), a postal worker and war veteran, plugging a guy at his window with a German Luger. Investigators turn up a marble head in his apartment. Asked what’s going on, he says, “The Sleeping Man.” Maybe he’s referring to Spike Lee, who seems to have taken a snooze in this jumble of confused plotting and characters with random motivation, stereotypes who forget from moment to moment what cliché they’re supposed to be. Set in a Tuscan village that was the site of a Nazi massacre, Miracle at St. Anna is meant as a tribute to the unheralded African-American soldiers who fought in World War II, but it comes off as the work of a director who’s lost his way. 160 minutes | Boston Common + Fenway + Fresh Pond + Chestnut Hill + Suburbs