Strong Performances Rocket ‘Fences’ to Amazing Heights (FILM REVIEW)

[rating=9.00]

Mixing no words, you will find no movie with better performances this year—or most years, in fact—than you’ll find in Fences. From its opening lines to its closing shots, Fences enraptures the audience with quick fire dialogue that comes as natural as a heartbeat.

It helps, of course, that the late, great August Wilson was a phenomenal playwright, brilliant at channeling the angst, hopes, and fears of a generation into cutting phrases that build into a jackhammer, stripping away pre-conceptions and notions to reveal hidden truths and realities, some of which we might prefer not to face.

Over the course of his career—life, really—Wilson challenged audiences to face the lasting legacy of racism and race relations in America. In his ten-play magnum opus, The Pittsburgh Cycle, of which Fences is a part, Wilson explored a century of African-American lives and the black experience in America. Set one-per-decade, Wilson blew the door on black lives wide open, crafting genius literary works that today stand as a testament to both the realities of the African-American experience and the universality of the human experience.

Fences is the 1950s chapter of the larger work, though you need no reference point to appreciate it. It, like the rest of his work, stands alone. Here, we follow the Maxson Family—Troy (Denzel Washington), Rose (Viola Davis), and son Cory (Jovan Adepo)—in their black working class Pittsburgh neighborhood. A sanitation worker, Troy struggles with his own sense of self and responsibilities to his family as they struggle to make it in the face of all the obstacles working against.

Washington and Davis reprise their roles from a 2010 Broadway revival of the play, which certainly adds to the intensity of their performances. On screen, the two share scenes in the same way as two accomplished musicians might share songs—rhythms and solos are traded off with a breathless ease as each alternately takes the reins and guides the melody. And like all great musicians, the two are backed up by a powerful band who serves to highlight the strengths and fill in the gaps.

Russell Hornsby (Grimm) is a particular highlight as Troy’s son from a former relationship, Lyons. Together, Washington and Hornsby play songs of strife; Mykelti Williamson, as Troy’s disabled brother Gabe, helps Washington play songs of regret and remorse.

But really, it’s the duo of Washington and Davis, and the occasional accompaniment of Adepo, that plays hardest and loudest. Theirs is a song of love, of laugh, of hope, of heartbreak, played with notes that shatter glass with their intensity. It’s stunning to watch, and to lose one’s self in their awe-inspiring, powerful portrayals.

Washington serves double duty here as director, guiding the cast through their beats to craft a film that’s utterly, devastatingly human. While cinematically the film can be criticized as lacking—for the most part, it feels as merely a filming of a play on real life sets instead of a stage—his light stylistic touch truly allows both Wilson’s words and the performances of himself and his actors to carry Fences to the stunning heights it eventually reaches.

The result is a film that’s as powerful as its portrayals are magnificent. Fences is the must-see film of the holiday season.

Fences is now playing in theaters everywhere.

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