IS GOD IS (A-minus) - This propulsive debut film -- about adult twin sisters seeking revenge on the father who set fire to them and their mother when the girls were little -- is marred only by its pulpy bloody final 20 minutes. Until then, its script is flawless and its depiction of sisterly bonds profound.
Aleshea Harris adapts her own play, exhibiting a sure hand, and carrying over some of the best elements of the stage (mostly the dialogue) without sacrificing a cinematic flair. She has an ear for patois -- the girls us "finna" in place of "gonna," and as one of them intones early on: "Dis destiny-type shit." The callbacks to literary stylings pair nicely with the hectic modern soundtrack (see below).
Kara Young (above left, as Racine) and Mallori Johnson (as Anaia) are believable out of the gate as sisters who share not only the fertilized egg that they came from but also an uncanny mind-meld, in which they complete each others' sentences and communicate telepathically (through words splayed on the screen). After their father torched their mother in a bathtub, leaving Racine with scars on her arm and Anaia facially disfigured, the girls were abandoned to the foster-care system, told that their mother had died.
But, no, their mother Ruby (Vivica A. Fox, below) -- whom they refer to as God (because Ruby made them) -- summons the girls, now adults, to her bed chamber with instructions to "Make your daddy dead. ... Real dead." While Anaia is reluctant to set out on a mission of vengeance (massaged as a mission from "god"), Racine is all-in, assuring her sister that she will take care of the dirty work.
The pair embark on a classic road trip through the South, meeting up with the crazed preacher named Divine (a delirious Erika Alexander) who took up with their dad after his arrest (and bore a son), the lawyer (Mykelti Williamson) who represented their dad back in the day (and was himself disfigured by his demonic client), and eventually their dad (Sterling K. Brown), who now lives in a mansion with a trophy wife (Janelle Monae) and another set of twins (aimless young-adult sons).
Along the way toward the climax, the girls' banter is sharp and incisive, and the set pieces with the preacher and the lawyer are laugh-out-loud funny. Harris cleverly skewers religious fundamentalism and the criminal-justice system, on a broader mission herself to explore the moral implications of exacting vengeance for an unspeakable act. Despite the heavy themes, the film is often loose and fun, with Racine and Anaia mostly having a blast. We get to peel the layers of each twin and learn that there are a lot more differences than we suspected -- and not just the obvious physical disparity that has given Anaia a lifetime of angst over her looks. Racine might have the pretty face, but she also exhibits a dark side, eager to lash out at the slightest provocations.
This all skates along effortlessly until the final reel, and the showdown with their father's family. I'm not familiar with Harris' original play or her first draft of a screenplay, but I have to believe that a Hollywood producer intervened, demanding a decidedly Tarantino tilt to the final 20 minutes. Like Quentin Tarantino's "Once Upon a Time ... in Hollywood," the bloodbath veers off the rails, and a near-perfect movie turns into just another reckless action flick. Harris does wrap things up in a rational manner, and the denouement is a mere blip in a powerful film.
I LOVE BOOSTERS (Incomplete) - I guess Boots Riley just ain't my jam. I devoted a little over an hour to the latest provocation from the writer-director whose previous film, "Sorry to Bother You," also brought ham-handed lunacy to an anti-capitalist diatribe.
Candy-colored and slap-dash in production, "I Love Boosters" is an adolescent's idea of a polemic. It relies on a ridiculous mid-movie twist that is just as silly as the gimmicks Riley tossed out in "Sorry to Bother You." If you don't mind cartoons, contrived storytelling and far-fetched plot twists, then settle in. (And who am I to argue with a full house of millennials, who hooted and laughed throughout the screening this week.)
The Boosters, who steal couture clothes and resell them, are brash young women (depicted from left above), Sade (Naomie Ackie), Mariah (Taylour Paige) and Corvette (Keke Palmer), determined to outsmart the evil designer Christie Smith (a scrawny Demi Moore) and make rent money while dismantling the bourgeois system that exploits workers (in China) and brainwashes the masses. But the plot is almost beside the point; instead, the brash visuals dominate the proceedings. Riley seems to have taken his cues from childhood screenings of TV episodes of "The Monkees," both aesthetically and philosophically. Christie Smith works out of a high-rise apartment that is built on a slant, so it's difficult to keep one's footing at the 45-degree angle. Yes, it's that level of klever.
Perhaps Riley's worst offense involves the sound mix. He commissions a corny circus-like soundtrack of tuneless noises from Tune-Yards, much of which obscures the dialogue, some of which is mumbled. I must have missed half the "jokes" here. There was nearly an hour left to endure, and I just couldn't bear to sit through the rest. I peeked at the Wikipedia plot summary, and I'm glad I bailed; it gets goofier.
It's a shame, because Palmer and the rest of her co-stars (including Lakeith Stanfield and Eiza Gonzales from "Baby Driver") are animated and committed. But too often they are tripping over Riley's awkward dialogue. Some people won't mind the mess.
BONUS TRACKS
"Is God Is" uses music masterfully, with a wide range of genres and eras. A key car scene features Racine head-banging to Death Grip's "Guillotine":
The film shares an energy with "Miss Me" by Leikeli47:
The film reaches back for some '70s funk vibe, courtesy of the retro "Groovy Flute" by Manu Dibango:
Finally, a beautiful gospel song from the '60s, revived in 2012, Shirley Ann Lee with "There's a Light":
No comments:
Post a Comment