Luce

Luce is a dangerous minefield and simply crackles with the kind of distressing pressure that is beginning to define America in every conversation we have about race, marginalization, social strata, woke politics and even marriage.

Watts’s insistence on pursuing in secret the truth about her son, as opposed to asking him simple questions outright, doesn’t quite track. The questions echo long after the credits roll — which is either brilliant or maddening, depending on who you ask.

It’s a remarkable, chilling performance: from Harrison, certainly, but also from his character, playing code-switching mind games with his teacher.

Anchored by standout performances by Naomi Watts, Octavia Spencer and young Kelvin Harrison Jr., it’s a strong indie film about race, family and trust that should connect with fans of smart, provocative cinema.

Luce is a taut, extremely watchable movie, though the dialogue could loosen up a touch.

In the end, you’re left with a movie that doesn’t quite jell but expands in the mind. It’s an excellent Book Club movie — it demands to be discussed, debated, embraced, or (perhaps) rejected.

Luce is the worst kind of provocateur; it tosses out all manner of outrageous ideas and then, like those pathetic dudes on Twitter, it yells out “DEBATE ME!” As soon as you accept the challenge, the film folds like cheap origami. And this film has a lot to toss at you.

Trump’s toxic America, has turned race, privilege, and class into incendiary topics while amplifying intolerance. The powerfully constructed “Luce,” mixes all these socio-political subjects into a provocative Molotov cocktail that ****, burns and leaves no easy answers.

Not for a single moment does the film turns into a preaching-to-the-choir tone, and that is its biggest achievement. Luce Onah's political film isn't exactly political. If anything it is a thriller. And that's what I loved the most about the film than any other theme or twist or trick it showcases. The co-writer and director Juilius Onah and the play by J.C. Lee- who also co-wrote the screenplay- from which it is adapted, eventually has a political film to endorse about. But that's as far as it would go. The debates, the ideologies or the profound theories are definitely circling around these sensitive subjects, but for the most part of the film, it is all a distraction. The actual heart of these arguments lie on the arrogance of these incredibly smart character on not bowing down to each other's theories. And from this spirals out a tug-of-war where step after step both of them (Octavia Spencer and Kelvin Harrison Jr.) are trying to outsmart each other. I cannot help myself but compare these throbbing philosophical and provoking arguments to Christopher Nolan's The Prestige and its take on fame, art and sacrifice. Spence and Harrison Jr. from the very beginning are tangled into unfathomable circumstances giving them an excuse of a specific perspective that acts as a double edged sword for both of them. Their denial isn't what's lagging or stretching this juicy case but is what's making it fun, entertaining and engaging. And this is the brilliance of the narration, What could have easily comes off as a pretentious or tedious detour, is instead smoothly spicing up this political drama. Tim Roth and Naomi Watts too are integrating the performance scale to a whole new level. Just watch them all sit in a room and greet each other, in the last act of the film, the tension cuts across their ability to harness a single good intention in this meeting where they gather to talk about Luce.

"Luce" is a picture with many questions and very few answers, not giving you enough information to know what the questions are! We have a white couple (Naomi Watts and Tim Roth) who adopted a black 7 year old boy(Kelvin Harrison Jr.) who was born in war torn Eritrea, Africa, and now is a model teenager who went through intensive therapy to be the perfect student and son. He is a soon-to-be valedictorian, a track star, football player, the debate team captain and to one of his black history teachers (Octavia Spencer) he represents what every black male should be who may or may not overstep her authority. She feels women must stand up for themselves using a student( Andrea Bang)) who may or may not have been assaulted by school jocks as an example and that men must be certain way. Luce, (Harrison Jr), writes an essay the history teacher (Spencer) asks the class to submit assuming the voice of a historical figure and instead of using someone like FDR as the teacher expected Luce uses the voice of Frantz Fanon, a French West Indian psychiatrist and revolutionary who talked about violence as a weapon. The screenwriters JC Lee and Julius Onah do not give you enough information on many points and Onah, who also directed, confuses things further by making cuts that make absolutely no sense. All of the cast are first class from the leads, especially Kelvin Harrison Jr, Noah Gaynor and Omar Brian Bradley as his friends with the latter losing a sports scholarship because he isn't a Luce model, Marxha Stephanie Blake as the history teacher's sister with a personality disorder plus Leo Norbert Butz as the principal of the school. "Luce" would have been a much better movie if either it made more sense or cleared up exactly what problems were involved and/or gave more information so a sensible debate could have taken place after the movie about some, if not all, the issues brought up.

(Mauro Lanari) Even in culture, art and cinema there is a difference between local and global themes: I consider the first to be nationalisms, neocolonialisms, neoimperalisms. For example, why should I be interested in everything that happens in the United States when some of the phenomena denounced are exclusive to them? Why should I be interested in the account of all forms of social conflict or racial issue if they are not interchangeable but follow different causal dynamics from country to country? Why should I endorse the synecdoche that any particular problem would have general value? Why should I care about Hollywood's eternal self-reflection on itself? What happened to reasoning on universal topics? Why should I be surprised and saddened if these acclaimed indie products are box office flops?

[SPOILER ALERT: This review contains spoilers.]