Tag: Reinaldo Marcus Green

King Richard

Posted on by victorfraga

While his most successful genre has been big budget blockbusters, Will Smith has made a few runs for Oscar gold in his career. The 52-year-old has been nominated twice, for 2001’s Ali (Michael Mann) and 2006 drama The Pursuit of Happyness (Gabriele Muccino). While he could well feel aggrieved that his transformation in Muhammad Ali wasn’t successful in earning Oscar gold, other ventures have felt a bit cynical, particularly the mawkish Seven Pounds (Muccino, 2008) and muddled sports drama Concussion (Peter Landesman, 2015). Now, he takes on a different kind of movie, in perhaps his best chance at glory yet.

King Richard tells the story of Richard Williams (Smith), a father of five living in LA’s Compton neighbourhood. Determined to keep his offspring off the streets, he sets out a plan for his daughters Venus and Serena (Saniyya Sidney and Demi Singleton) to become tennis stars. Coaching them himself using little more than books and tapes, he forces his way into the insular world of tennis to get them to notice two of the brightest talents in the sport’s history.

Every aspect of the film is designed to inspire, from the rousing score to the many speeches delivered, reminding us of the importance of the Williams Sisters not just to sport, but to African-American culture. This may trigger a cynical instinct in some viewers, but hindsight is on the filmmakers’ side. Williams did set out this path for his daughters, he did train them on the courts of Compton with the sound of gunshots in the background. However, this is more than a sob story. It’s about the perseverance and single-mindedness it takes to be a champion, and the foresight to create something that no one has ever seen before. The presence of snobbery and classism in the sport makes a compelling argument: Williams’ vision for his daughters may border on obsessional, but it is far better than the abusive country club parents who berate Venus’ opponents. The belief, and the vindication of it, makes for a feel-good couple of hours.

Of course, this is a Hollywood biopic, and if there is a flaw it’s in the refusal to question much about its subject. Williams is always right, and even when he’s not it’s for a good reason. His scene-stealing nature is treated as just another quirk, while the film’s focus on Richard means his wife Brandy (Aunjanue Ellis) and the sisters themselves become supporting players in their own story. It’s no more than any other biopic would do, but it’s clear this is a version of events meant to cement a legacy, rather than dissect it.

In Williams, Smith could arguably have found a kindred spirit. The man who has dominated TV, music, and film industries during his career has always meticulously planned out his next move, but in this role, he gives us something a bit more natural. Smith makes the most of the stage he is given, transforming himself beyond the tics and whistled H’s to show us a man aggressively manifesting. While he has his character’s mannerism down, some of the best moments come in silence, such as a scene when Richard witnesses a drive-by shooting, or confronts a gang member interested in his daughter. Many of the actor’s dramas have felt like auditions for The Academy, but here he simply does justice to the character and produces one of his best turns in twenty years.

The lead takes up a lot of space, but there are interesting performances around it. As ever, John Bernthal does great things with a small role, playing Venus’ coach Rick Macci. Aunjanue Ellis is superb as Brandy, but her lack of time on-screen can often be frustrating given how good she is with the scenes she has. At one point, Macci accuses his client of making everything “The Richard Williams Show”, and in the film itself, the quality of Smith’s work comes at the price of other characters.

History is written by the victors, and Williams’ remarkable journey deserves just as much generosity on screen as the many other biopics that gloss over the negatives. An uplifting portrait of The American Dream, King Richard may have what it takes to fill its star’s Oscar destiny.

King Richard is showing in cinemas and also on various streaming platforms.

Monsters and Men

Posted on by victorfraga

Darius Larson (Samel Edwards), a very friendly Afro-American dealer of illegal cigarettes, stands outside a small shop in the Bed-Stuy area of Brooklyn and meets all the local dudes. One of them is Manny (Anthony Ramos) who gets a bit of cash off him and then goes home to his wife and little daughter. Later, while out walking in the street in the evening, Manny comes across Darius, who police are trying to arrest outside the shop. Manny whips out his mobile and starts filming. Manny is not particularly interested in filming anything significant, but suddenly Darius is shot dead and Manny realises that he has recorded the full details of Darius’s death.

The recorded footage on the mobile is the central theme of the film as it reveals that Darius was shot dead without justification. All three characters who look at it closely realise that they should act on what they see. Manny acts and is viciously compromised by the cops. Dennis Williams, (acted with great nuance by John David Washington), an honest Afro-American cop who works in the same precinct as the bad cops reports it but is thwarted by the response to his report.

Zyrick Jr., a promising young African-American baseball star realise that he must act up after the cops plant incriminating material. This is to his father’s overwhelming disappointment. He is desperate for his son to succeed at baseball and, as a cop himself, does not want to rock any boats.

The film quietly but insistently emphasises how trapped people are in the machinations of power. The response to Dennis’s report is typical of the methods of power. He is interviewed with great courtesy and correctness by an investigator (an Afro-American woman) and invited to say what he knows about the bad cops (about who complaints on other matters have been made). He cannot, however, really do so as he has not worked closely with them. As the investigator leaves, she looks at him as if he is a tremendous waster of time. Dennis is not a waster of time.

The main fact is that Darius was shot dead without any justification. The establishment always makes a show of investigating criminal matters in the periphery, while carefully avoiding the root causes of the problem. Even if police forces have “rotten apples” in their midst, which their superiors deplore, not too much bad publicity is allowed to get out. This is not just an American phenomenon. It featured at the Hillsborough football stadium investigation, the shootings in Derry on Bloody Sunday and the Guildford Four.

The situation of Zyrick’s father is particularly sad. He is a loyal cop and like many Afro-American is desperate for his son to escape the obscurity of his birth by succeeding at sport. He accepts, however, that “these things happen” and it is better to leave matters as they are.

This emphasises the slogan “Black Lives Matter”. The fact is that in American society Afrp-Americans count for less, as did Irish peasants in the United Kingdom in the 19th century, East Enders in London, the tenants of Grenfell Tower, the inhabitants of favelas in Brazil, poor African peasants in the hand of ruthless dictators and so the list can go on. The film quietly and insistently demonstrates how good people are caught up in the processes of power and find it hard to escape. This is done without an undue amount of Hollywood special effects or plangent script-writing although touching scenes of children playing with the protagonists (for instance, Manny and his little daughter sending a paper dart over the Brooklyn roof-tops) tells us in a thoroughly clunky Hollywood manner that these are, after all, very decent people.

Monsters and Men isn’t just an angry movie about “Black Lives Matter” pushing all the right emotional buttons. It goes much deeper than that in its concerns, covering the experience of virtually anyone who speaks “truth to power”. The film premiered in Sundance 2018, where it was described as a “hit”. It is out in cinemas across the UK on Friday, January 18th and then on VoD on Monday, January 21st.