Fences

Friendship, family, filaments and filibusters, Denzel Washington's Fences (based upon the play by August Wilson) encloses dreams and protests and confrontations within a patriarchal shard, not that there isn't a willingness to entertain, as long as his fam remembers who's regally legion.

Potatoes and lard.

He's sacrificed a lot to responsibly take care of things, but his personal experience blinds him to the realities facing his youngest son (Jovan Adepo as Cory), who has a shot at playing professional football, even if dad had to spend his career on the sidelines (baseball).

The answer lies within the stories he dramatically tells, stories which enthusiastically explain how the United States changed over the course of the last 40 years (the film's set in the 1950s), meaning that if America's current composition is resoundingly different from that within which he wildly grew up, the tough lessons he learned through his trials may no longer directly apply to his son's struggles, a son who may therefore have opportunities that were cruelly denied him.

He can't understand the new, he can't comprehend change.

He's hard on his wife Rose (Viola Davis) as well, delivering a devastating blow just as their lives start to become less burdensome.

No settling into old age.

No moving on to greener pastures.

It's not as sad as all that when you listen to him telling his tales, nevertheless, when you watch as he multidimensionally exhales fiction, reverie, and fact.

Denzel (Troy) delivers a brilliant performance full of love, contempt, joy, confusion, understanding, obstinacy, fear, and courage, if you ever wondered why he's been so successful for the last thirty years, Fences offers distinct evidence, as Washington proves that he's far beyond playing typecast roles, that he can indeed competently display intricate multilateral e/motions.

While playing a regular guy.

Viola Davis excels as well.

The film's reminiscent of adaptations of Tennessee Williams or Edward Albee plays, an expansive, caring, sophisticated, realistically controversial examination of real people living hard lives, who aren't afraid to share extended thoughts and commentaries.

Lives being lived, power struggles crisp and bold.

Brief moments of tantalizing largesse.

Rustling through rhythms.

Struggles struck and starchy.

Electric portions.