Wolfsong (2013)

When I first clicked ‘play’ to watch ‘They Fight’ and began seeing André Holland in a do-rag and prison scrubs begging for his freedom, my first reaction was to click ‘stop’ and find something else to watch. I did not want to watch another Black man in a stereotypical role. The next day I came back and continued to watch it with an underlying sense of dismay.

Here’s the set-up: An ex-con/ex-boxing coach with an ex-lover wanders into the Congress Park Recreational Center and finds redemption.

I really wanted to like this film but it was hard to see past all the tropes that appear from the very beginning.  André Holland(Walter) and Wendell Pierce(Slim) were as brilliant as always. Unfortunately, their impeccable performances were in the context of appealing to the “White gaze” - a term coined by Toni Morrison describing how Black art is altered to fit the perceptions of non-melanated folks. 

It’s important to note the source material for this project is a documentary of the same title and a Washington Post article that chronicles the story of a self-taught boxing coach who uses the sweet science to connect with his stepson and eventually impacts the young men of Southeast DC. Some of those key elements that made this story so compelling were eliminated from the HULU original film.

‘Exhibiting Forgiveness’ seeks to ask one question, “What do you do when your parents are the source of your pain?”

‘Tarrell Rodin’(André Holland) is a successful painter who struggles with a dark past of patriarchal violence which tortures him in the form of physically wrenching nightmares. The kind of nightmares that bring on such anxiety that he stops breathing. He is frustrated with his fragmented memory which prohibits him from dealing with his tortured childhood.

For 15 years he has tried to paint away his pain but as time passes it no longer helps him process his trauma. All of this comes to bear when his father shows up while trying to move his mom out of her house. She insists ‘La Ron’(John Earl Jelks) has changed and ‘Tarrell’ should forgive him. As the title suggests, this is the theme of the movie. The push and pull of being compelled to forgive an abuser when you can’t forget the abuse.

TWO DADS. A portion of the movie follows ‘Tarrell’s’ father. In the opening scene he is depicted as homeless, wandering the streets cleaning people’s cars. When a store owner who is sympathetic to his situation is attacked, he unsuccessfully attempts to thwart the robbery. This chain of events lead him into the main plot.