The late two-time Pulitzer
Prize winning playwright August Wilson’s Tony Award winning Fences finally makes the debut to the
silver screen after nearly thirty-three years thanks to actor/director Denzel
Washington in his third effort both in front of and behind the camera,
resulting in one of the year’s most captivating minimalist small town
dramas. Set in the 1950s in an
impoverished black neighborhood in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, the film is a
character study of a former Negro League player turned garbage man named Troy
Maxson (Washington in the lead role) approaching the precipice of a midlife
crisis as his son grows into a teenager and his marital relations with his wife
Rose (Viola Davis) become strained. Meanwhile
an underlying thread involving Troy constructing a fence to shield himself from
his neighbors in addition to his own fear of dying, Fences presents a difficult, alienating character in the throes of
implosion in the face of an ever changing world around him.
Wearing the modestly sized scale
of the theater stage play setup on its sleeves, this almost entirely dialogue
driven piece is set to become one of the year’s surprise Oscar contenders with
fantastic performances from all involved with a near silent power that rendered
the audience I saw it with speechless. Nearly
all of it consists of exchanges in the backyard with the completion of the
insulating fence indicating the passage of time over the course of the
picture. Akin to The Great Santini with keen observation of the increasingly
contentious father-son dynamic and heated tensions growing between the married
couple, Fences is heartwarming,
compelling, moving and at times painful to watch as we see a man at crossroads
losing his grip on his life, family and friends.
Cinematography by Charlotte
Bruus Christensen is scenic with moments of occasional scope and the ambient
score by Marcelo Zarvos serves as a soft hiss of a whisper augmenting the quiet
drama. Ultimately though, the film is an
actors’ piece serving as a platform for Viola Davis and Denzel Washington to
love and lock horns with the backyard as the playing field. Also among the key supporting players include
Stephen Henderson as Troy’s lifelong friend Jim Bono, Mykelti Williamson (Bubba
from Forrest Gump) as Troy’s mentally
disabled younger brother and Jovan Adepo as Troy’s rebellious son Cory, all of
whom are equally excellent. Much like
Kelly Reichardt’s Certain Women released
earlier this year, Fences is less
interested in decoding the central protagonist’s behavior as it is in observing
him living in the moment as the world moves on past him.
 |
| My tummy hurts. You have any of that there Pepto Bismol? |
Moving at a leisurely pace
exceeding the two-hour mark, Fences isn’t
so much a plot driven piece as it is an observation of a man who blames nearly
everyone but himself for the hardships and misfortunes befalling him. Some viewers may get a little restless at the
intense quiet and the gentle pacing, but for my money these characters over the
course of the movie became as real as anyone you’ve known your whole life. More than anything, the film and the play
function as a study of an entire generation trapped in the past and unable to
accept the impact their actions have on the present. I found it wholly captivating and see it as
another example of why Denzel Washington is considered one of the finest actors
still in the business today.
Score:
- Andrew Kotwicki