American Fiction

I hate having to pick apart a movie when its heart is in the right place, but the delivery mucks it all up. American Fiction's intent is good. It wants to take a look at racial stereotypes and the marketplace, the hypocrisy that can exist behind white liberal guilt, and whether art has a responsibility to itself and to the consumer of achieving a certain standard. Ostensibly the story of a struggling writer and college professor who writes a shallow novel using every cliché from gangsta rap and "urban" culture that ends up becoming way more popular than his more literary fare (and put a pin in that, because we'll come back to the "ostensibly"), American Fiction aims to be a satirical look at art, its consumers, its creators, and the industry as a whole. There is some intelligent discourse to be had and some amusement to be found in scenes like Monk (the main character) wanting to talk about a book with the N-word in the title, and a white student getting more offended about it than him, or the publishers of his trashy novel being open to changing the title to "Fuck" out of wanting to appease the "angry black man" Monk has to pretend to be as part of his pseudonym. And I should praise the acting in this before I get too deep into the college thesis that will be my criticism of this movie. Everybody here does such a wonderful job with what they're given. But this is where my praise ends. While I was amused enough to get it over the median score, I cannot deny that this movie, both thematically and structurally, is an absolute dumpster fire. The themes are probably the lesser of the two major issues. On the surface, they're completely reasonable, and I appreciate that American Fiction doesn't seek to push the viewer into one viewpoint or another. There is another writer who publishes a book similar to Monk's, and he ends up meeting her. They discuss their respective books (although he's pretending his book isn't his), and he asks how they differ. The other writer gives her defense, but the movie never goes the extra mile in showing us how they're different. "I did a lot of research" doesn't explain why the writing of her book reads like a satire of Ebonics. And while the other writer's matter-of-fact "it's what the market wants" may be true in the literal sense, it doesn't explain WHY she decided to pander to the lowest common denominator. And it doesn't explain why her book, which is highly regarded, is ignored by an award committee, but his book is embraced. This is the fundamental problem with how the movie explores its issues and themes; it wants to bring up the issue, and it doesn't want to make a decision for you, but it also doesn't give enough information to consider. And while Monk certainly has a point in that kind of writing being debasing and pandering, he's also a smug, jaded, holier-than-thou jerk that seems to think all art should be capital-A Art and it should Say Something and Mean Something. Monk's viewpoint seems to judge anyone who just wants to watch a dumb movie with some boobs and explosions instead of some profound reflection on the human condition, or listen to Motley Crue instead of Radiohead. Whatever revelations this movie might inspire in someone is undercut by the movie's unwillingness to actually engage with its topic beyond throwing it out there as a conversation starter. The other, and much larger, issue is that pin I put in earlier when I said what this movie is ostensibly about. That is because, in addition to trying to be this satirical examination of art and race, it is also about: - Monk being put on sabbatical from teaching due to a confrontation with a student, - Monk going home to Boston to discuss elder care for his sun-downing mother, - Monk's strained relationship with his siblings, - Monk's sister, who is their mother's primary caregiver, suddenly dying from a heart attack, - Monk being thrust into figuring out how to take care of his mother, - Monk's mother wandering out of the house in the middle of the night, - Monk's brother revealing his marriage is dead and he is gay, - Monk's brother indulging in self-destructive behavior to "make up for lost time", - Monk getting into a new relationship with the woman who lives across the street from his mother, - Monk's mother's live-in caretaker getting married, - Monk being invited to participate as a judge for a prestigious literary award, - Monk dealing with his jealousy over the success of another author, - Monk and his siblings still processing their father's suicide. American Fiction doesn't feel like a movie, it feels like a recap video for the previous season of a TV show before the season premiere. And that's to say nothing of the several sub-plot strands surrounding his book, like maintaining the cover story, meeting with a movie producer, the FBI looking into the pseudonym's backstory (the fake author's biography is he's a wanted fugitive), appearing on talk shows, and wrestling with the frustration that his "good" writing couldn't get anybody's attention, but his "bad" writing is a media sensation. It also doesn't help that the movie's editing treats the space-time continuum like an amateur boxer working over a speed bag. How much time passes? Who knows. Is his agent in Boston or LA? Not entirely sure. There's one scene where Monk is the passenger in a car and he takes a call. Who is driving? Where is he going? Don't know, we're never shown. Buried in all of these storylines is an attempt at satire, but if 15% of the movie is actually dedicated to it, I'd be shocked. I respect American Fiction's intentions, and I give props to the actors here. They all did the best they could. Unfortunately, the movie around them is an incoherent mess of sub-plots, a jumbled nightmare of editing, and an attempt to examine race and art but only from a reasonably safe distance and with the scrutiny of a preschooler. If this had been a show on HBO, or picked either the family drama or writing story, it could've been something. But as it is, it's part of a lot of things, but not committed enough to any one of them to be its own thing.