Feelings

Failing to make an emotional connection with two intense films: 

FRUITVALE STATION (B) - A solid by-the-book rendering of the last hours in the life of a young black man shot to death by a transit cop for the Oakland subway system. Director Ryan Coogler does a fine job bringing this true story to the big screen.

Michael B. Jordan is compelling as Oscar Grant, who struggles to do right by girlfriend Sophina (Melonie Diaz), daughter Tatiana (Ariana Neal) and his mother (Octavia Spencer). Oscar has been to prison before, has lost his job, and must battle the urge to sell drugs to pay the rent. So he's no choirboy, although Coogler's depiction is of a lovable big bear who comforts a dying dog (huge metaphor there) and seems to have finally decided to turn his life around.

As much as Coogler and Jordan venture toward Oscar's dark side -- Jordan can darken his eyes and flash a numbing glare on cue -- this production can't help tipping the balance toward Oscar's essential good nature, especially his expressions of love for Tatiana. That thrusts the supporting cast into thankless roles of long-suffering women more commonly found in a TV Movie of the Week.

Coogler shows great command here, and he manages to build tension even though the audience knows what's coming. While he often captures the menace and confusion of the confrontation itself, the overall drama feels deflated by the end, and Spencer becomes just another mother praying for her son only to end up mourning over his body with what feels like empty words.

CLEAN, SHAVEN (1993) (C) - What the ... ? The debut from Lodge Kerrigan -- who scored in 2004 with a somewhat similar story, the jittery psychodrama "Keane" -- is a disturbing glimpse into the mind of a violent schizophrenic searching for his daughter. Kerrigan skews experimental, and here it's sometimes tough to follow along amid the voices and buzzing noises in the head of Peter Winter (Peter Greene, who was Zed in "Pulp Fiction"). (An old-fashioned push-button car radio that emits mostly static and cross-talk is an overused and clunky metaphor.)

I had to fast-forward through some explicit scenes of bloodied young bodies and self-mutilation. It was as tough to watch as "Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer" was. I also struggled to find a reason to care about this story. It borrows heavily from early David Lynch (it's as if Eraserhead took off in a '70s road movie) but lacks sophisticated characterizations.

Kerrigan doesn't dawdle; this clocks in at 79 minutes (quicker, of course, if you zip through some scenes). Lately he's been directing episodes of "Homeland" (Damian Lewis starred in "Keane") and "The Killing." Maybe Kerrigan has finally found a happy medium 20 years on.