Nike is celebrating 50 years and has planned a month of events and activities to mark the occasion, drawing from its Department of Nike Archives (DNA). Among the projects unveiled by the brand is the short film “Seen It All,” directed by Spike Lee, who has had a strong relationship with Nike for decades and in the 1980s shot commercials that helped boost the brand’s popularity, especially the unforgettable ones with Michael Jordan. In the video, the two-time Oscar-winning director returns to play Mars Blackmon himself, a fictional character played by Lee in the 1986 film She’s Gotta Have It, and later the star of those same commercials that defined an era of sports communication and beyond.
More than 40 Nike athletes appear in nearly five minutes, from LeBron James to Serena Williams, Tiger Woods to Cristiano Ronaldo and Mia Hamm. Spike Lee traces the history of the achievements of swoosh-branded athletes in a dialogue with Zimmie, played by Indigo Hubbard-Salk who during a chess game compares the generation of past athletes with the generation of new faces, represented by Ja Morant, Naomi Osaka or Mbappè.
The exchange of banter between the two seems like a rap challenge, which ends with the two protagonists realizing that every moment is a beginning, Mars must not think he has already seen it all, as Zimmie suggests to him.
