by
Keep an eye on this sensitive topic as "White Boy Rick" becomes more of a thing on social media and in reguar media this month.
"Most of Rick’s cronies are very sketchily defined," the critic writes. (Sony Pictures photos)
A leading Los Angeles film critic, Stephen Farber, is surprised that every black figure in a film about crack dealing on Detroit's east side is marginalized or two-dimensional. "All the black characters are reduced to little more than malignant supporting players," he writes in The Hollywood Reporter.
His review of a movie reaching screens Aug. 14 follows Labor Day weekend screenings at the Telluride Film Festival in Colorado.
Farber, president of the Los Angeles Film Critics Association from 1994-2016, has written four books about the industry. His critical take could spark wider discussion of whether the film about Richard Wershe Jr. disrespects its black characters.
Here's how Farber frames what he sees as storytelling flaws and disrespectful character development by director Yann Demange and the three screenwriters:
There are a lot of African-American characters in this movie, but almost none of them comes alive. The film is so focused on the two white protagonists that all the black characters are reduced to little more than malignant supporting players in the main characters’ saga.
The script by Andy Weiss, Logan Miller and Noah Miller fails to rise to the challenge of the subject by marginalizing all of these black characters. Rick Jr. seems hypnotized by the idea of having black friends. (He also fathers a child with a young black woman.)
But most of Rick’s cronies are very sketchily defined, and fine actors like RJ Cyler ("Me and Earl and the Dying Girl" and the Showtime series "I'm Dying Up Here") have almost nothing to do. Compare the treatment of the African-American characters in "Moonlight," another movie about crack cocaine addiction during the '80s — the texture and depth of that film are sadly missing here.
That said, the script fails to do justice to any of the supporting characters, white or black.
Farber's strong critique encompasses the overall movie.
"The film has a few polemical points to make about the hypocrisy of the war on drugs in the Reagan era and about the harsh sentencing laws that destroyed many young lives," he observes.
What happened to Wershe, who served more than 29 years of a life sentence before parole in July 2017, "may well have been a gross miscarriage of justice, but the film never succeeds in turning this legal travesty into a meaningful or moving human drama."
Related coverage:
First Reviews: 'White Boy Rick' Gets Thumbs Down from 3 Film Critics, Sept. 3
Richie Merritt (rear), as Richard Wershe Jr., visits a Las Vegas prize fight with "Curry Crew" crack dealers from Detroit -- led by Leo (Big Man) Curry, played by rapper YG.
