Fences

2016's "Fences" by Danzel Washington.

Starring Danzel Washington, Viola Davis, and Jovan Adepo.
Nominated for Best Picture, Actor (Washington), Supporting Actress (Davis), and adapted screenplay by August Wilson. 

It's based in 1950's Pittsburgh, where an ex con and ex negro league baseball player turned garbage man (Washington) navigates through his job pressures and complicated family life. Faithful wife (Davis) supports him and their 2 children (1 from a previous relationship), while Washington's handicapped brother, Mykelti Williamson, has his own struggles. Washington's youngest son (Adepo) is trying to become a football player on scholarship, and Washington forbids this, for reasons we learn reveal a complicated and very flawed man. All involved must make tough choices as to the limits of family support as Washington pushes his limits.

"Fences" was a 1983 pulitzer prize winning play, and Washington and Davis are ferociously good in their roles, devouring us in their wake. You can see why it was a project Washington was passionate about translating, with great performances all around. It's just unfortunate that the translation doesn't work. Theatre and film are 2 extremely different mediums, and you realize it most adeptly here (just like in 2013's "August: Osage County" misfire). It's not that theatre inspired movies can't work- witness 1958's "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof", or the magnificent 1992's "Glengarry Glen Ross", or even the movie shot as if it was a play, 2003's "Dogville". But the dialogue and staging of the actors in a play is often deliberately showy and almost artificial, to draw light to the larger than life drama of the characters. Movies, with their 360 degrees of observation, go wider and broader, with editing to reduce (or build tension) and create kinetic energy. "Fences" may swing for just that, but you wish the sport was different.

3/5

Trailer: Click Here.