Checked out the new flick Best of Enemies which is the true story of school integration and the unlikely friendship between the Klan leader and a black community activist in 1970. This is a well-meaning but ultimately wrong-headed and poorly scripted movie. I wish I could have enjoyed it more.
Best of Enemies is about a small town in the south where the local black school burns down. Without anywhere else to finish the school year, they try to integrate the white school but the Klan isn’t fond of that idea. So the town sets up a community council to hash out the issues and try to find grounds that can help everyone. The local Klan leader (played by Sam Rockwell) and a local black activist (played by Taraji P. Henson) are the leaders of each side of the debate. The two are not exactly friends but find they have to work together.. or at least be in the same room at the same time without shouting at each other. Minor spoiler: the two ultimately become life-long friends and she gives his eulogy when he dies in the early 2000s.
I rarely talk about hot button political issues that surround a movie in order to just talk about what’s on screen. But this movie deserves some scorn for its presentation of the Klan and White Savior tropes. While I can’t argue that this is a true story and this klansman did change his mind and become life-long friends with his political (and racial) enemy, I can’t imagine it went down like this movie presented it.
The biggest problem with the film (spoiler alert) is how it presents the Klan guy’s Come to Jesus moment where he rips up his Klan ID and votes for school integration. Which is fine… it’s great and it is probably even true. But almost nothing in the movie convinced me he would make this sudden, life-changing decision. It’s a total failure of storytelling… there are couple of things that happen that make him think, but nothing is really SHOWN convincingly and no conversations are had. He just, spur of the moment, changes his mind.
Which also presents a White Savior trope since it’s his unearned turn that saves the day and causes the orchestra to crescendo with his courage. Meanwhile, the black women never changes and never gets particularly close or friendly with him… and is largely just an Angry Black Woman trope.
It’s based on a true story and knowing all this went down in one fashion or another is still interesting. And it’s not like the acting is bad or the camera work and cinematography is bad. It’s a well produced movie. It’s not a disaster of a flick… it’s just poorly written or maybe poorly edited (maybe there’s more character growth or interactions that were cut for time).
Even with all the good intentions in the world, the movie fails on a basic level and I can’t recommend it. I’d still give it a decent overall score since I can’t say it’s otherwise a poorly made film. Gotta be fair, I guess.
Score: 74