Luce (2019)

If you don't leave the film Luce with a broken heart, a sore head, and a question about everything you think might be true you aren't paying attention. This is a complex heady film which rips your heart out and reminds us just how little we understand anything about ourselves.

Luce never gives you the luxury of knowing what side to be on. Luce never entertains the idea there might be a right answer. Luce never lets you feel there are good characters or bad ones, at least not for very long. Just when you start to feel like you are getting a handle on whats going on the film makes you see another perspective. And then it ends leaving you in the exact same place.

Young director Julius Onah is still early in his career but Luce is an achievement usually reserved for more seasoned directors. He handles the film's complexities with grace and dexterity. The film never drags or becomes predictable. He doesn't play any tricks, just tells us his story without holding our hands. He casts a trifecta of talented vets in Octavia Spencer, Naomi Watts, and Tim Roth who all play their difficult parts well making us love, hate, resent, pity, and empathize with. A film like this wouldn't work without such a strong cast. But it's Kelvin Harrison Jr. as the title character who truly shines, giving one of the most complicated performances of the year, and showing a real potential. He's certainly one I want to watch.

Luce is described as "provocative" but I find that word can be misleading. Sometimes it evokes the idea of provocation for the sake of provocation. I didn't get that with Luce. Instead I got a story which challenged me to see all sides of an issue, to understand why people do bad things, and question what being good and bad even means. It's a rumination on how difficult, no impossible, it is to live up to our ideals and what failure looks like. Luce is riveting if completely discouraging while at the same time feeling utterly human.

You need to be ready for a film like Luce. It's not passive, escapist viewing. This film is a challenging watch but worth the payoff. When the last scene abruptly ends, you just sit there with the weight of it. And you need a good discussion after.

Luce
Starring: Kelvin Harrison Jr., Octavia Spencer, Naomi Watts, Tim Roth
Director: Julius Onah
Writers: JC Lee, Julius Onah