American Fiction Movie Review

This film is Cord Jefferson’s directorial debut. He wrote nine episodes of “Watchman” and twenty-five episodes of “The Good Place” so it was not a shock that this script was very well written and glorious in every way. ​

It’s heart-wrenching and quite humorous at the same time. The acting was so good you were attached to each character from the get-go. This isn’t a big award-winning film, but it’s a must-see, especially with the climate we’re in. It’s difficult to laugh right now, and it’s movies like these we must cling to, to remind us that we’re all neighbors and in this together.

At the beginning of the film, the professor and writer Thelonious ‘Monk’ Ellison, played by Jeffrey Wright, who has been in almost everything, including, “The French Dispatch” and “Rustin,” is attempting to teach the people in his “American South” class how black people are seen by the average Caucasian person. He wants them to see that the “N” word shouldn’t be so intimidating. He tells Brittany (a white student played by Skyler Wright from Dexter: New Blood) that if they could get over the word, she could, too. But she’s uptight and offended by having to see it written on the board.

He doesn’t know how to get through to them on this subject.  He feels very lucky that the book he’s attempting to get published has some attention, but he feels like a failure when he finds out that the publishing company is passing. He doesn’t believe in RACE, but apparently everyone else does and his book isn’t “Black” enough. He learns this when no one is at his panel but are instead at Sintara Golden’s book reading “We’s Lives in Da Ghetto” instead. She’s played by Tracee Ellis Ross from “Barbie” and “Vengeance.” He’s SHOCKED when he hears her read from her book. After she says that she wants more representation for her people, she reads, “What fo, she ax,” to applause. His jaw hits the floor.

He goes to tell his sister Lisa, played by Tracee Ellis Ross from “Black-ish” and “Candy Cane Lane,” that he can’t write what’s not inside of him and gets a mouthful from her about the family. He learns that there’s a lot going on that he has been ignoring as he tries to sell a book no one wants to read. On top of family issues, he’s now blocked.

With his mother (Leslie Uggams) ill and when he loses his sister out of the blue (and they were very close), he decides to be who the people want him to be. If he can get CLOSER to his now out-of-the-closet brother, played hilariously by Sterling K. Brown, he can get down to writing this new book. He names it, “My Pafology.”

He desperately wants to be a read writer. How he feels he’s going to be able to succeed in doing so is to debase himself and oversimplify his style. Off he writes, and it’s published. Everyone is filled with joy. His book starts doing well and a studio is interested in turning it into a film. His constant question now is, is it the literary establishment who loves him, or is it guilty white readers? He’s curious as to why his book is doing well and why all this money is being thrown at him all of a sudden. He’s reminded that it’s simply that the best is expensive and not many can have it. But something that’s good enough and cost-effective, the people are going to buy it… over and over again. He takes that as he’s a good writer, he just needs to relax and be excited that he’s read at all.

*Based on “Erasure” by Percival Everett 

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