Previously we updated you on a film release called “American Skin”. We thought because of the award it won it was going to be a great, not this one. This is going to be a review of a profoundly, sometimes unwatchable, terrible film and I can honestly say that without provocation. This is just a bad movie. Awful.

Plot?

This particular film, if you don’t know, is about police brutality. Nate Parker stars as Lincoln Jefferson veteran who works as a janitor at a prestigious private school so his 14 year old son Johnny can attend said school. One day, after a racially profiled traffic stop, his son Cajohnny is killed by a police officer. After the shooting, a film student begins to make a documentary about Lincoln and his grief. However, when the grand jury decision not to indict the cop comes down Lincoln and his friends, decide to hold the precinct hostage and force the kid to keep filming. At this point, I am trying my hardest to keep watching. The first 15 minutes are an excruciating experience, really bland, boring and dull film. So when the guns came out I was thinking differently, like this could get interesting. But no, it is so much worse. Lincoln doesn’t go on a grief induced rage, Chris dormer style, instead he insists on holding a mock trial using the civilians who were in the precinct when they took over as well as any non violent offenders they happen to find downstairs and got held up waiting in the jail.

Stating The Obvious

During this time in the movie, it seems to blatantly rip off the negotiator in the worst possible way. Now if this were more smartly written and they were able to more effectively recreate the structure and tone of a legal thriller, it would have potential.

But the middle of this film breaks out into literally a community theater production. It basically feels like the comment section of every Facebook post you saw in 2020 after the George Floyd protests. Scene after scene of random background characters chiming in with prolonged embarrassing opinions about race relations and police procedure. Eventually, you the viewer are exhausted from the massive bombardment of interesting personal opinions. There’s just nothing meaningful or new or illuminating about these debates. There is no drama and no insight. This is a movie that repeatedly strays from its already dubious mockumentary framework, to have black people explain the politics of being black, to other black people. This movie has no problem stating the obvious. All I can really say is don’t watch this movie if you have a septic tank to empty out, or some extremely painful back surgery you have been neglecting. We give this one a ½ charm and we don’t even have a half charm.