Bron Studios, Escape Artists, MACRO,

Denzel Washington, Viola Davis, Russell Hornsby, Mykelti Williamson, Jovan Adepo, Saniyya Sidney, Christopher Mele

Troy Maxson (Denzel Washington) and his wife Rose (Viola Davis) struggle to survive in the Hill District in Pittsburgh in the 1950’s. Troy works as a trash man in the city, and brings his pay home to his wife to struggle through another week. Troy is a harsh man, having had a very rough childhood without a father, then spending a stint in prison for being stupid, and now trying to make a go of it for his family. But his older son is estranged and doesn’t come home, and his youngest son has a passion for football and has a planned scholarship for college as a football player. But everything blows up, as the problems mount faster than Troy can deal with them, as it all comes crashing down in a thunderous climax.

This film got a lot of honors during last season’s awards season, and this is probably the best film of 2016 in my book. This is a film that I really wanted to see in the theater, but was never able to pull it off. Then when it came out on DVD, I had it at the top of my queue on the day it was released. NetFlix has been playing games lately where they will send you one less than the number of free items in you queue and make you wait an extra day for the last one. Due to that, Fences ended up on the “Long Wait” game, so I decided rather than going out to RedBox or to rent this ON DEMAND, I would keep it at the top of the queue and see how well NetFlix could do at getting a movie I really wanted to see. Months have gone by and I finally got it this week. This was really worth the wait. One of the lines in the movie is something like: “Some people build fences to keep people out, but some people build them to keep people in.” This movie is called Fences for two reasons. One is the fence that Troy has always been promising to build, but it’s also a metaphor for Troy’s family and how he is losing them while he’s trying to hold him. This film reminded me a lot of the classic “Raising in the Sun” and is a very touching and well performed film about the trials and tribulations facing poor people back in the 50’s that will ring true today. It is very dramatic, and has a lot of dialog, but is very well portrayed. Growing up in Western Pa in the 1950’s myself, I was able to understand the feel of the movie. It’s very Pittsburgh. The entire cast is superb, and there is a lot of harsh reality, but a lot of tenderness underneath that is hard to show. This is an excellent film, and a wonderful story that is very much worth the praise heaped on it. This one should have swept the Oscars, and it was robbed when it didn’t. I recommend you watch this one!

EdG – EdsReview Dot Com – A Movie Review Blog

 

 

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