Today’s Alternative Views recommendation comes way of Sundance and a few other festivals. Apparently, it failed to get wide distribution. The reasons for that oversight will remain mysteries to me. This film is hella powerful.
The Inevitable Defeat of Mister and Pete (2013), Skylan Brooks, Ethan Dizon, Jennifer Hudson
Director: George Tillman
Writer: Michael Starrbury
One review of this film opined that it bordered on “poverty porn”. I can’t agree. Director George Tillman pointed his camera matter-of-factly at life in a Brooklyn housing project. It’s not prurient. It’s not judgmental. It just is the life lived by 13-year-old Mister (Skylan Brooks), his addicted mother, Gloria (Jennifer Hudson) and their semi-permanent house guest, 9-year-old Pete (Ethan Dizon), himself the child of an addict even worse off than Gloria.
At first, I was put off by the premise of the film; Mister and Pete eke out an existence over a summer after Gloria is arrested. Mister doesn’t want to be placed in Riverview, a notorious group home for foster children. Pete doesn’t wish to go his own home at all because his mother is never there and the neighbors are dangerous.
“Oh please.”, I smugly thought to my smug self, “Two kids escape the notice of CPS for a whole summer?? What is this? ‘Home Alone’ as drama?” I prepared myself for some sort of ridiculous Poverty Porn. Boy, was I quickly shut down in that prejudgment.
Michael Starrbury’s excellent script and Tillman’s skillful direction showed exactly how plausible such a story could be in the neglected projects of Brooklyn, especially when accompanied by the overburdened foster care system. While I watched Mister and Pete struggle to survive through one financial blow after another (because they’re children with no source of income), I found myself trying to brush aside a nagging sense of horror. There could be hundreds of Misters and Petes out there on the streets of New York right now. No one is looking out for them. No one knows they have no supervision; not even a caring – if badly disabled – parent like Gloria.
The ending is rushed and somewhat too saccharine for the balance of the story. But, that may have been the better choice. We want to have hope for Mister and Pete. We’ve already come to see just how resilient and resourceful they are. The alternative – perhaps the more realistic likelihood – would have been too much of a downer. Mister will be OK. We just know he will. He has to be.
See this film. Come for the Jennifer Hudson; here playing a worn-out, insulting, stereotyped role, but to perfection. She nails a perfect combination of denial, bravada, and self-loathing. Stay for the powerhouse performances of Skylan Brooks and Ethan Dizon. I’m still in disbelief that this fantastic a film was carried by two children. Simply amazing.
On Netflix now.