“American Fiction” is a social satire by first-time filmmaker Cord Jefferson. It stars Jeffrey Wright as Thelonious “Monk” Ellison, a brilliant but struggling African American author frustrated with the popularity of novels based on black stereotypes which almost exclusively serve white people who want to seem more racially conscious and, in oversimplified and overused terms, “woke.” As a joke one night, he writes a book parodying this under an alias, and suddenly the book is taken seriously and becomes a massive hit, much to Monk’s chagrin.
After seeing the trailer for this film, it became my most anticipated movie for the rest of the year. Finally, a Hollywood film that criticizes the leaders of the entertainment industry’s attempt to hide their own racial ignorance/insecurities by “promoting” what they perceive to be “minority stories,” which do not actually represent all of said minority group. This trend has been apparent for years and years, so it’s about time a high-profile film tackles it, especially in comedic form. Unfortunately, “American Fiction” doesn’t fully live up to its ambitions.
This film has a constant internal struggle between the much-needed message and the borderline-melodramatic family dynamics. One half of the film is the satire you actually want to see, whereas the other half is a jumbled, uninteresting exploration of Monk’s family. Whenever “American Fiction” focuses on the comedy, it really, really shines. This film has the funniest scenes of the year, and the gradual elevation of the absurdity is glorious. “American Fiction” is one of those incredibly rare instances where every single joke lands. My theater was roaring with laughter throughout, in large part due to Jeffrey Wright’s career-best performance. He plays the cynical aging man flawlessly; every word out of his mouth seems both inspired and exhausted. It is a truly magnificent performance that is well-deserving of an Oscar nomination.
Yet the theme isn’t only portrayed through comedy, but also through quieter moments. The best scene in the movie is between Monk and Sintara Golden (played by Issa Rae), another African American author who wrote the kind of book Monk despises. There is a wonderful, lengthy exchange of philosophies as they banter, during which the film portrays both sides of the argument thoroughly and objectively.
But then we have to cut from those scenes to Monk talking to his newfound girlfriend, or Monk’s homosexual brother dealing with their parents’ homophobia, or Monk having to put his mother in a nursing home. I’m sorry, but I just don’t care… at least about two of those relationships. The brother dynamic works well within the message and themes of the film, but the girlfriend and mother subplots are insufferably dull and unnecessary. This is a two-hour film and I could really feel it. Jefferson should have cut all of the family elements (except for the brother) out of the script and expanded upon the chaos surrounding Monk’s book. As is, the family drama detracts from the momentum of the actually compelling parts of the story.
“American Fiction” is unintentionally engineered for the Fandango Movieclips YouTube channel since it would be so easy to clip 10 laugh-out-loud satirical moments and leave out the boring family drama. This is Cord Jefferson’s first feature film screenplay and I’m sorry to say that it is blatantly apparent. He desperately needed a script doctor to focus the story. At its current state, “American Fiction” is a collection of moments, of two different films stitched together. One film is the modern-day “Dr. Strangelove” (that’s how phenomenal the satire is) and the other is a slightly elevated Hallmark Channel movie.
B