Mark Reviews Movies: CLEMENCY

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Review by Mark Dujsik | December 26, 2019

Writer/director Chinonye Chukwu attempts to juggle multiple characters and ideas in Clemency, a story about the emotional and psychological grind of working on death row. Each of those characters and all of those ideas are, perhaps, worth exploring, but some of them are certainly more engaging and intriguing than others. In weighing them all together and with an almost equal sense of significance, Chukwu never finds a narrative through line to match the potential of this story.

The filmmaker comes close in her depiction of Bernadine Williams (Alfre Woodard), the warden of a prison with a death row. The movie begins with the botched execution of one inmate, overseen by Bernadine, who repeatedly orders the needle to be inserted in increasingly painful places. The man dies but only, it seems, because of luck.

Woodard's performance, which communicates an increasing level of internalized doubt and pain beneath the character's all-business exterior, is the highlight of the movie. We can't quite say it's the character, if only because Bernadine, who does remain the core of the story, becomes less important as we meet other figures in her life.

Of secondary significance to the story is the next inmate scheduled to die. He's Anthony Woods (Aldis Hodge), convicted of murdering a police officer about 15 years ago. He admits to participating in the robbery that resulted in the officer's death, but Anthony denies having any role in the murder itself. His execution date has been scheduled, and as she did during the previous execution in her prison, Bernadine has to maintain a professional air about her, even as she tells Anthony about the process of what will happen on the day of his "procedure," asks the inmate if he wants any witnesses in the observation room, and points out that he can have any meal that he wants as his final one.

The movie is at its most effective when it simply follows Bernadine, going through these motions of routine and procedure with an almost apathetic sense of calm. From that opening scene, in which we see a condemned man crying out in pain and hear the sound of his heartbeat as it races with every needle-prick through the final injection, Chukwu's opinion of capital punishment seems clear. Bernadine's indifferent approach to all of this, though, might be the movie's most pointed critique, with her mounting unrest with the system serving as the statement's punctuation.

The filmmaker certainly gives voice to the other side, especially by having the parents (played by Vernee Watson and Dennis Haskins) of the murdered police officer made a focal point in three scenes (although their case is kind of undermined by the movie's unquestioned assertion that Anthony didn't directly kill the man). Even before that first execution, though, we see Bernadine comforting the condemned prisoner's mother—offering hope of a last-minute stay that she knows is unlikely, if not impossible. Anthony's attorney Marty (Richard Schiff), who insists that Anthony is his final client, adds to Bernadine's growing burden: If he does his job well, Marty tells the warden (at a bar that has become her first stop after work), it means that a person isn't killed.

Chukwu doesn't quite trust the inherent power and conflict of this basic setup—simply observing Bernadine as her job, which has become an act of going through the motions, becomes an intolerable web of hypocrisy and uncaring routine, all of it leading to one death after another. There are a few subplots here that become more distraction than a means of insight. There's Bernadine's husband Jonathan (Wendell Pierce), a teacher, who respects his wife's work but also resents how her job has made him seem invisible (He reads from a Ralph Ellison novel to his class and groans in recognition—just in case the point isn't already clear).

He exists in this story for some melodrama involving their relationship (He leaves home for a bit but quickly returns), but Jonathan primarily (and ironically) is here as a sounding board for Bernadine's big monologue about being haunted by the dozen men whose lives have ended under her tenure. We don't need the monologue to comprehend that idea, such is the subtly communicative strength of Woodard's performance. Meanwhile, scenes of Bernadine at home offer at least some respite from the psychological turmoil of the prison, but they only offer a different, less impactful kind of misery for the story.

Another side note involves Anthony's own personal life, as he learns that he has a son from a relationship that ended as soon as he was convicted. It's meant, perhaps, as a way to provide an additional measure of sympathy for the character, as well as Bernadine's final act of trying to bring some humanity to this system, making desperate calls as the clock ticks toward Anthony's sentence being fulfilled, and some comfort to Anthony—maybe more to herself.

There's a fine, complex character study in between these secondary concerns and storylines, but Clemency doesn't possess quite enough faith to focus exclusively on that. A strong character and a stronger performance, then, are ultimately overshadowed by Chukwu's desire to say and do more than needs to be said and done.

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