American Fiction

Holy cow, y’all!

In the months I’ve been going to Regals’s Monday Mystery Movie, I’ve slowly become resigned to them exclusively showing unknown trash. They hooked me initially by showing Sisu, which was great, then following it up with Hypnotic, which I’d been looking forward to (although it sucked). Since then, they’ve mostly shown anonymous, cookie cutter dreck. Poorly executed action movies with one or two big names but which you haven’t heard of for a reason. I kept going out of optimism, and I though the best I could hope for was It’s a Wonderful Knife, which wasn’t great but at least was different. So my guess for this week was The Cello, a trashy looking horror movie with a few notable actors, and not much else.

So imagine my surprise when we open on Jeffrey Wright’s face. I gasped. No way Regal was showing a movie I was actually hyped for, which even had some buzz out of TIFF? Well, their ploy worked, and I’ll continue to endure the garbage they show most weeks just for a chance to catch something like this weeks in advance.

Thelonious Ellison (Jeffrey Wright) is frustrated. Although a published author, he hasn’t seen much success, and is having trouble selling his most recent manuscript. Not only that, but he’s frequently told publishers want a “Black book”, like We’s Lives In Da Ghetto by Sintara Golden (Issa Rae). Books which pander to white people’s idea of Black struggle, which flatten out huge swaths of people into a handful of tired stereotypes. As he endures a number of familial struggles and feels the weight of the associated bills, he decides to write his own, My Pafology. Which begins his journey into the world of white obsession with Black pain.

In addition to that core, there are a bunch of subplots swirling around Ellison. The sudden death of his sister Lisa (Tracee Ellis Ross), his mother’s (Leslie Uggams) dementia diagnosis, his burgeoning relationship with Coraline (Erika Alexander), and his brother Cliff’s (Sterling K. Brown) whole deal. And slightly more removed, family housekeeper Lorraine (Myra Lucretia Taylor) is getting married to local security guard Maynard (Raymond Anthony Thomas).

All of these additional stories make for quite a lovely film, and contrast in interesting ways with the main thread. They’re charming, full of familiar and relatable relationships and warmth, and yes, some conflict, but between people who ultimately care about each other, even if they’re not always perfect at expressing it. So they do an excellent job fleshing out the characters and the world.

But as you may have intuited from the sheer quantity, they’re more important than that, and have deeper thematic ties. Almost none of them are explicitly connected into what Ellison is going through or his jaded outlook on the world, but they provide commentary nonetheless. For example, in dealing with his mother’s dementia, on a few occasions he’s forced to play along with her delusions, and thus present the world to her in the way she wants to see it rather than how it really is. By far the biggest theme throughout is that of acceptance. Acceptance of others, of reality, and of yourself. It’s driven home especially hard with Cliff. He somewhat recently came out as gay, to mixed reactions from those in his life. Including their mother, who low key is in denial of that fact, even if she hasn’t fully disowned him. So when he’s later extended love for who he is and where he’s at with no conditions, we see his soul shatter with gratitude and relief. The facial expression he makes at that moment alone should garner Brown an Oscar nomination.

All of which ties back to Ellison striving to make it in the literary world. We come to understand that while he’s legitimately frustrated about the types of portrayals of Black people in literature, some of that is also due to feeling like the world is rejecting him. He doesn’t feel he can show his true self, and creating the character of Stagg R. Leigh (the pseudonym under which My Pafology was written) seems to extend that deeper into his personal life, causing fractures with those he cares about. The more praise and accolades My Pafology receives, the more he feels it.

Tonally, this movie feels of a piece with You Hurt My Feelings and Showing Up, and other slight, quiet comedies/adult dramas of recent years. It’s undoubtedly funny, but most of the laughs are small chuckles, with the bigger reactions largely coming from absurdity. The characters are all pretty well-realized, with enough of their own lives and backstories to feel real. They come in all types, and none are given short shift.

Of course, what sets this movie apart is that it has something more to say. It’s nothing earth shattering or new, but the sentiment is no less important. It’s present throughout in Ellison’s repeated points about how the publishing world is flooded by people trying to cash in on white guilt, and white people who want to deflect accusations of racism. We get myriad little pieces of performative white outrage, such as in the opening scene in which one of Ellison’s students walks out of class because he wrote the title of a book on the whiteboard which includes the word “Nigger”. Well-meaning people nonetheless parroting back what they think they’re supposed to say and do to appear progressive and woke without really understanding what it all means.

The best scene in the film comes near the end, when Ellison has the chance to talk to Sintara Golden. They have a very nuanced and interesting discussion about her book vs. his, the merits of this type of writing, how much the veracity does (or doesn’t) come through in each, and whether either book is selling out “their people”. For as good as she is throughout the movie, Issa Rae is especially remarkable in that scene, as it’s the first time we get to understand her, since Ellison has only known her as a public figure until now. It also affords her the opportunity to land the most effective line in the whole movie, which sums up the whole thing: “Potential is what people see when what's in front of them isn't good enough”.

But coming back to its tone, if you’ve seen either of the referenced movies, you know they’re very small and low key and quiet. They tell intimate stories with a fairly light touch. And so it is here. American Fiction is never quite as sharp as you want it to be. It makes its point, but is never quite pointed. It challenges certain perspectives, but isn’t particularly challenging. So while there is some depth here, it all comes across as kind of slight. Which blunts its impact, unfortunately. The depth of the connection between various parts of the film does lend it some strength, as there’s something even more to chew on. But even that takes away somewhat from what appears to be the central purpose of the film.

All that being said, this is a wonderful movie. The drama really lands in a sweet way, somehow managing to keep all its threads clear and clean and well played out. The performances are all quite good, with Sterling K. Brown as the clear standout in just about every scene he’s in. The script is outstanding, and probably deserves a nomination for Best Adapted Screenplay (this is based on the book Erasure by Percival Everett). At the end of the day, I’m always gonna be excited to see a quiet, slightly off the beaten path adult drama like this get a theatrical release. Here’s hoping it does well, giving studios reason to continue doing so.