AMERICAN FICTION - Mark Reviews Movies

American Fiction, Orion Pictures

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Review by Mark Dujsik | December 14, 2023

American Fiction is a movie of two halves. Half of it is a scathing critique of what constitutes legitimate and legitimately Black art and entertainment. The other seems to attempt to serve as a counter to what writer/director Cord Jefferson—as well as, presumably, author Percival Everett, whose novel Erasure the filmmaker has adapted—sees as the wrong forms of that art and entertainment. They exist side by side in this movie, and because the respective tones of each half are so disparate, Jefferson's project never feels like a cohesive whole.

Those two halves, at least, are engaging, albeit in completely different ways. We'll start, as we probably should, with the more daring and incisive element of this narrative, if only because it's the more obvious and sellable hook of the movie.

That sees Thelonious "Monk" Ellison (Jeffrey Wright), a university professor and the writer of a couple novels, fed up with the lack of his own authorial success and the rise to prominence of works—not to mention their authors—that seem to exploit, diminish, and stereotype the Black experience. Well, the problem is that Monk doesn't think these books and movies serve as some summation of that experience.

What does he see? A television channel promotes a month of programming devoted to Black stories, and the commercial is filled with images of movies about enslavement, living in bad neighborhoods, becoming involved in gang life, dealing and using all sorts of illegal drugs, and getting caught up in a world of violence.

What does he hear? At a reading for a newly released novel that's already a best seller before it's on the shelves, he hears the author (played by Issa Rae) speak of her undergraduate experience and her early work at a New York City publishing house—until she starts reading from her book. The vernacular within it is nothing like the way she talks, and Monk can only raise an eyebrow and look in disbelief. Here it is again: another piece of media, he has to assume, that's all about how miserable the lives of Black people can be. The interviewer and the audience—mostly white—just lap it up with self-satisfied smiles and nods that suggest a knowledge they certainly don't possess—on an economic level, almost certainly, and on a racial level, most definitely.

The resulting gimmick here is ingenious and biting. After some drinks and a lot of familial drama, Monk decides to write a satirical version of such a story under a pseudonym. The opening scene plays out in his mind for us, as a young Black man, a member of a gang and a habitual drug user, confronts his absentee, alcoholic father through dialogue that spells out everything about how terrible their lives have been and are.

Monk assumes nobody will buy it, either figuratively or literally. After having his agent (played by John Ortiz) submit it to a few publishers who turned down his most recent book, however, it turns out at least one of them does buy it—and wants to pay three-quarters of a million dollars to publish it.

That's one half of this story, and it's very funny in a pointed way that finds new, logical avenues to travel, as Monk's fake book becomes its own sensation before pretty much anyone has read it—even a big-time Hollywood producer, who wants to adapt it and has other people read for him. In need of money, Monk goes along with it, playing the part of a fugitive felon over the phone and in person to convince everyone to keep the project moving. They don't need much convincing, and that's a big part of why the joke feels so uncomfortably convincing.

The other half, which is quite good on its own but doesn't fully gel with the satire of the other, shows why Monk needs the money. He and his family are struggling, particularly because his mother (played by Leslie Uggams) is showing signs of dementia, his sister Lisa (Tracee Ellis Ross) is having a difficult time caring for the mother on her own, and his brother Clifford (Sterling K. Brown) has gone through a finance-wrecking divorce after coming out as gay.

Here, then, is a direct counter to Monk's major complaint about literary world and Hollywood's depiction of Black lives, because here are some real people with ordinary but challenging struggles. The story even makes room for Monk's sweet romance with neighbor Coraline (Erika Alexander), which only adds to the difficulties of Monk's life because of how stubborn and emotionally distanced he can become.

Again, there's nothing inherently off about either of these two modes of the movie—except that they do feel like two, completely different modes within the same movie. One's a wicked joke, made at the expense of industries that, honestly, probably deserve more of a satirical lambasting than is offered here. The other is far from a joke, observing how grief persists and how anxieties of failure can become a self-fulfilling prophecy of sorts.

It's easy enough to see the latter as an answer to the intrinsic question of the former. Is there a way to make such distinct narratives feel of a singular, coherent piece? Undoubtedly, there is, but despite a Wright performance that comes close to bridging the gap, American Fiction doesn't pull of that difficult trick.

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