Most of Spike Lee’s movies are loud, vibrant affairs with whiplash editing, dollops of humor, and a deep dive into black culture and how America has consistently and sometimes gleefully failed people of color. He’s also a stylist with a strong sense of film history. That comes out most in his more serious, contemplative works: the epic Malcolm X (his best) echoes David Lean, and Inside Man has its roots in 1970s capers. In Da 5 Bloods, he seems to be echoing Vietnam War films of the ’70s and ’80s, but in a clever twist, he actually pays homage to The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, and I can guarantee you, John Huston would approve.

The story begins as four veterans return to Vietnam. There is Melvin (Isiah Washington Jr.), the gregarious medic of the black squad the Big Red One (another movie homage there); Eddie (Norm Lewis), the most financially successful of the bunch; the grounded Otis (Clarke Peters); and finally Paul (Delroy Lindo), who is angry and volatile. Ostensibly, they are going in country to retrieve the remains of their squad leader, Norman (Chadwick Boseman), who was killed in a botched search and rescue mission. The four survivors are also after a cache of gold bars—payment from the CIA to the North Vietnamese villages—hidden in the jungle. That’s what the soldiers were attempting to rescue in their mission five decades earlier.

The film toggles back and forth in time from the current era as the four veterans reconnect, party, and discuss their difficulties in life and as veterans. Back in 1971, they stood in awe of Norman, who managed to keep his head on his shoulders and his squad alive. He was their beachhead and benchmark, their moral center and their exemplar of living as a black man with honor and integrity in a society that deemed them less than equal and fodder for whatever war America happened to be fighting. When the squad first found the aforementioned cache of gold, Norman had the idea to redistribute it to worthy causes, calling it reparations.

And that’s where we land in the present, as a Vietnamese travel guide, Vinh (Johnny Tri Nguyen), gives them a generous tour of Ho Chi Minh City’s night life. This allows viewers to get to know the characters, and since Lee is in an expansive mood, this pretty much takes up a third of the running time. This is also where he lays down the complications of the plot to come, none of which I will reveal. This section highlights the bond between the men, how they hold each other up and help each other, even after decades of not seeing each other. Then, once the gold is found, which, of course, one expects it to be, you watch in agony as that bond frays and, for a couple of the men, breaks.

Again, Lee has leaned on the past. Not only is this a classic adventure story, it also functions mostly, and succeeds wildly, as melodrama. Lee is usually not one prone to sentiment. Even in his funniest and sweetest films, he approaches his subject with clear eyes. Here, there are long monologues between the men ending in bear hugs, usually with one of them in tears.

There are moments that almost run to heights of soap opera sudsiness when Otis reaches out to a Vietnamese woman, Tien (Le Y Lan), who he knew and loved while on tour. She now has connections that will help the guys get the gold out of the country. As they strategize in her high-rise apartment, a young woman walks in and is introduced as Tien’s daughter. She is clearly biracial. Otis sits in stunned silence as the implications sink in. After the daughter leaves, Otis asks the obvious question. Tien will not answer him, but instead she gives him a scathing account of the racism she and her daughter were subjected to. This is high drama that would be the climax of another film, but here it’s a side plot, one of many. There are plenty of moments like this that are less reliant on the main story line but notch the drama up considerably.

Da 5 Bloods is just as haphazard plotwise as many of Lee’s projects. Paul’s son, David (Jonathan Majors), shows up halfway through to play an integral part in the proceedings, but the reason for his appearance is paper-thin, to say the least. There’s also a trio of land mine removers added to the mix to inform us that these explosives are still a problem in the country. Otherwise, there really isn’t much reason for these characters to appear.

But the skill of Lee and his collaborators blow past these quibbles. Terence Blanchard’s offers a mournful and majestic score, the thread that holds together this patchwork quilt. The performances are spot-on as well. Everyone is nothing less than excellent. But Lindo’s work is beyond exceptional. It’s a performance steeped in anger, guilt, and sorrow. Unable to confront the past, Paul battles everyone in the present. Lindo has a preternatural sense of what a scene needs. He knows when it needs to be played straightforwardly and when to go for broke. Spike recognizes this and lets Lindo be. It is a glorious performance. If this doesn’t net Lindo an Academy Award nomination at the very least, it would be a tremendous injustice.

Ultimately, Da 5 Bloods is Lee’s most entertaining film in years. It is also among his best.