Movie: Fruitvale Station (Ryan Coogler, 2013)
This film holds up and may even be better than I remembered. I was not sure it would. Back in 2013 it felt like a really big deal that a widely released American film would acknowledge so openly the police killings of (unarmed) black Americans. I have never seen an audience leave a theater as silently and as contemplatively as the Dutch audience did at the end of this film. That response fitted the film, which was deeply invested in showing the humanity and love of everyone on screen, including most of the white people, and was more thoughtful and sad than angry. If anyone soon makes a film about George Floyd, it will certainly strive for a different mood and feel.
The film's supposed social importance aside, I also felt like it signaled the arrival of a director who would be making great films for a long time. Many people obviously disagree, but Ryan Coogler has not had the most interesting post-Fruitvale Station career. Black Panther is probably the best Marvel film, but it's still very much a Marvel film, while in my view Creed 2, directed by Steven Caple Jr (a director I know nothing about), is miles better than its predecessor. With Creed Coogler tried to combine an understated black social drama with the mythology of Rocky. In doing so Rocky overshadowed the new characters, while being turned into an outdated oaf. One of the most cringey moments in recent American film occurs when Creed talks to Rocky about the cloud and the latter confusingly looks to the sky. Creed 2 just decides to Rockify everything, fully incorporating Adonis and Bianca into the Rocky myth and its kitschy grandeur, unabashed sincerity and melodramatic (but honest!) humanity. This allows them to express grand feelings about love, boxing, their lives, Rocky and Drago, an approach that fits the expressive and unreserved acting styles of Tessa Thompson and Michael B. Jordan incredibly well. Creed 2 is not just a great Rocky film (only the oiginal 1976 one is better, and I am even not 100% sure about that) but also one of the greatest romances of this century. I suppose you have to thank Coogler for setting it up, but that he didn't come close to pulling of anything like it, doesn't speak for him.
Coogler's next job is Black Panther 2, which is set to be one of the most dutiful and depressing film productions in recent history. IMDB also lists Wrong Answer as a Coogler film in development, which is sitting there since after Fruitvale Station. That was also when Ta-Nehisi Coates (who has written the screenplay for the film) was at the height of his relevance. So even if it gets eventually made, it feels like its moment has passed. All in all, it would be great if Coogler soon escapes the franchise machinery, to have a real career. Same goes for Jordan, who is currently Hollywood's biggest victim of nepotism; he should be getting John David Washington's roles. But whatever happens to Jordan and Coogler, they will always have Fruitvale Station. It is really a great film.
Fruitvale Station is one of those 'a day in the life' films. What distinguishes it from many similar works is that it is much more attuned to the rhythms of daily life. Almost the entire first half of the film consists of Oscar Grant (Jordan) running errands, with Coogler patiently showing all the boring detail that goes into running an errand. When Oscar for example needs to pick up his girlfriend Sophina (Melonie Diaz) from work after pumping gas, we see every unexciting step necessary to complete that process, including Oscar parking the car, switching off the engine, opening the door of his car, getting out of the car, closing the door of his car, walking towards Sophina, Sophina walking towards him, opening the door of their car, getting into the car, having a conversation about what errand they have to run next, switching on the engine, and driving off. I know writing this all out looks a bit silly, but it's worth considering how many films striving for realism go to great lengths to apply a naturalistic aesthetic to portray 'ordinary' characters doing 'realistic' things to achieve 'realistic' goals, and then skip showing most of the steps in this process. By not doing that Fruitvale Station manages to mirror the tempo of real life, which may be more important for an authentic depiction of daily life than showing ordinary, recognisable events. It only steps wrong twice, once when it flashes back to the previous year, and once when it portrays a foot race between Oscar and his daughter in slow motion.
Fruitvale Station does not just take place on any random day. It takes place on 31 December and it gets the particular mood and development of that day and the curious experience of doing a lot of stuff whose importance is diminished by the knowledge that everything that's not connected to the nightly celebrations will be swiftly forgotten. More importantly, it gets that New Year's is the closest thing we have to a global shared experience, which means that basically everyone we meet in the film conducts themselves similarly to Oscar and (broadly) shares his mood and mindset. This is true whether they are white, black or any other cultural or racial background. There is nothing Oscar and his friends do differently than the white people we see in the film. But Oscar and his friends are forcibly taken off the train, beaten and harassed until a white cop kills Oscar. That ultimately is what keeps this film politically, not just cinematically, relevant. Through its humane depiction of Oscar it also points out that, all things being equal, black people are much more likely to be killed (or to end up in jail) than white people.
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