Intelligent, challenging satire mixes with moving family drama in this excellent debut

Director: Cord Jefferson

Cast: Jeffrey Wright (Dr Thelonius “Monk” Ellison), Tracee Ellis Ross (Dr Lisa Ellison), Issa Rae (Sintara Golden), Sterling K. Brown (Dr Clifford Ellison), John Ortiz (Arthur), Erika Alexander (Coraline), Leslie Uggams (Agnes Ellison), Adam Brody (Wiley), Keith David (Willy the Wonker), Okrieriete Onaodowan (Van Go Jenkins), Myra Lucretia Taylor (Lorraine), Raymond Anthony Thomas (Maynard)

Dr Theolonius “Monk” Ellison (Jeffrey Wright) is fed up. His new book is getting no traction with publishers, who want a “Black book” not the classics-inspired literary novels Monk writes. His family life is at a point of crisis: his mother (Leslie Uggams) has rapidly onset dementia, his doctor sister Lisa (Tracee Ellis Ross) is divorced and tired of being the only child looking after her, his plastic surgeon brother Cliff (Sterling K. Brown) is embracing his coming-out and divorce with drugs and a parade of younger boyfriends. In need of money to pay for his mother’s care, Monk pours his frustrations into writing exactly the sort of book publishers want: My Pafology, a crime-drugs-and-deadbeat filled stereotypical low-brow “Black” novel that he submits as a joke. Needless to say, the liberal white publishers come back with bank-busting advances, wowed by this “authentic Black voice” – much to Monk’s disbelief and self-loathing indignation.

This satire is the flashy clothing American Fiction dresses itself up in. In this impressively confident debut from writer-director Cord Jefferson, it frequently pulls out some whipper-sharp comic lines as it skewers the guilt-ridden pretentions of the liberal white elite, so concerned with being seen to care about embracing Black culture, that they don’t even notice they have effectively ghettoised Black culture into exactly the sort of crime-and-drugs nonsense Monk satirises in his fake novel. It’s a good joke, and the fact that Cord Jefferson’s film wears it a bit thin (the parade of self-congratulatory white people falling over themselves to praise the novel are fundamentally reprising the same joke each time – nothing new is added once you’ve got it the first time) doesn’t change that.

Interestingly, as I sat in an Oxford cinema-screening exclusively filled with white people laughing, I realised American Fiction is its own sort of meta-satire. How many people in the cinema I sat in realised they were proving the point of the film? American Fiction displays to white people a funny sketch about our own concerns to be seen to be saying and doing the right thing. We laugh at these idiots and reassure ourselves that we would never be so utterly unaware about our patronising gate-keeping, while also embodying many of the attitudes the film is skewering. We want to be seen to be right-on and laughing at the right things. It’s a neat way for Jefferson to both entertain and challenge us.

Jefferson’s film is partly about urging us to break beyond our shallow ideas of what “Black America” must be. Monk comes from an affluent middle-class family that, skin colour aside, wouldn’t like out of place in the Hamptons. His background is one of beach-house second-homes, art on the walls, lacrosse sticks in his bedroom and a family where everyone has a doctorate. He even has a devoted housekeeper, expertly played by Myra Lucretia Taylor, who’s both an honorary aunt and also a shrewd commentary on stereotypical Black servants, calling the children “Mr Monk” and “Mr Cliff”.

While Monk writes about the urban ghetto with satiric anger, it’s clear that world is almost totally alien to him. The film itself acknowledges it: in an intriguing exchange, Issa Rae’s author of a more stereotypical ‘Black’ novel (We’s All Lives in the Ghetto) even calls out Monk for us air of class-based judgement around other parts of the Black community, social commentary I would have liked the film to challenge more (The film encourages us to question Monk, a snob and arguably a slight bully, but frequently gives him a pass by contrasting him to the ridiculous and more selfish characters around him). It would have been interesting to see more of the reaction to the book from Black readers, not just white ones eager to show their credentials.

American Fiction though takes on the targets it goes for with a certain aplomb. Publishers, literary prize givers and the overtly-but-dutifully-PC are effectively skewered. It’s also one of the few books that really gives a sense of writing. Monk’s drafting of the novel sees the characters he is bringing life to appear in his study with him, parroting his dialogue and then turning to discuss character, motivation and make suggestions to the author. More of this, giving us more insight into the novel and the assumptions that underline Monk’s writing of it, would have given an interesting extra dimension to the film’s satire.

Jefferson’s clever and vibrant film suckers us in with satire, but really flourishes as a complex family drama. He offers an affecting and compassionate storyline of siblings who have grown apart due to their natural inclination to independence, distance and repressed emotion. (It’s suggested this is a trait inherited from their father, a famed surgeon with a rollcall of infidelities.) American Fiction beautifully sketches very natural portraits of siblings who know exactly how to push each other’s buttons, but also quickly fall back onto a shared language of memories and mutual experience. For all the satire, it’s as a heartfelt, small-scale family piece that the film really excels.

This is partly because it gives such wonderful opportunities to a fabulous array of actors. Jeffrey Wright, so often a supporting player quietly adding depth to a series of under-written franchise films, is excellent as Monk. Wright perfectly captures his hangdog resentments, his bitterness at not getting a fair deal and middle-age ennui. He also brings to life the pre-emptive walls Monk has built up to keep pain (and other people) out, the same intellectual distance that makes his books hard-sells. Combine that with Wright’s expert comic timing – not only his awkwardly uncomfortable shifts into his urban persona, but also his head-in-hands exasperation at the shallowness of the world – and this is a brilliant showcase for a consistently impressive actor.

Equally fine is Sterling K Brown as Monk’s frequently selfish brother Cliff, trying to enjoy life while he can – like Wright, Brown’s comic and emotional touch are spot-on. The film touches on themes of generational homophobia – their increasingly senile mother, sensitively played by Leslie Uggams, is clearly disapproving of his sexuality – but doesn’t hit this beat too hard. Tracee Ellis Ross is a breath of life-filled air as Monk’s sister while Erika Alexander gives emotional weight and depth to a slightly underwritten part as Monk’s new neighbour turned girlfriend Coraline.

American Fiction is frequently stronger when it focuses on crafting this low-key, realistic family drama, refreshingly clear of manufactured drama. What people will remember though is funny (if slightly one-note) satire – Monk even turns his story into exactly the sort of cross-racial appeal movie ready to collect awards, that you could argue American Fiction itself is. American Fiction ends with several alternative endings, each of which just made me feel Jefferson himself wasn’t sure how to end it. But, on the whole, this is a highly promising debut from Cord Jefferson, crammed with excellent dialogue and performances, which casts a fresh and urgent eye on important questions.