Checked out the nerve-wracking and compelling movie Detroit. Well, mostly nerve-wracking and mostly compelling anyway.
This is a misnamed movie… it’s set in Detroit and is about the 1967 Detroit riots… or, rather, a specific event that happened at the Algiers hotel in Detroit during the 1967 riots. Calling the entire movie Detroit does a disservice to the city since the flick isn’t really focusing on the city itself. Events that happened there but not nearly enough about the overall city. It’s also not really about the riots or their causes… you get the point watching it that something has been boiling and the opening text suggests it, but you aren’t going to get a good history lesson here except for the events at the hotel and their aftermath.
So the film opens with a raid on an unlicensed liquor bar that is basically the fuse that sets off the riots. The film then spends time cataloging events in a very war-story way. The film was directed by Kathryn Bigelow whose last two movies were the war-themed Zero Dark Thirty and Hurt Locker and she brings those chops to the riots. So the first part of the flick is filmed kind of like a war movie where chaos reigns in the streets.
The second part is when the events at the Algiers hotel occur. The Detroit police, state police, and the military are set up and on edge throughout the city when someone in the hotel fires off a starting pistol at the cops. The cops are already paranoid about snipers on roof tops so move into the hotel and basically torment and brutalize the mostly black customers. Three men wind up dead. This sequence is filmed like a home invasion horror movie and it’s very effective.
The third part – which is where the movie started to lose me – is a very protracted series of events that followed. A court room scene with the cops on trial where we sadly know the verdict in advance. The film follows a handful of other people who either survived the hotel or were related to people who didn’t… and this went on for WAY too long. I eventually realized what the movie was doing – letting some of the air out of the intense first two-thirds but also giving us the unfortunate and expected resolution in terms of the legal system and the impact on the survivors. I see what it was doing but I still felt it dragged on way too long.
Part of the problem is that the movie makes an attempt – but not a good one – and humanizing the players in the movie. It’s not enough and too many people barely get any back story for me to really care that much about their life afterwords. I should care because they are humans but I am looking at the flick as a movie.
So, yes, this is a good movie and I respect why it’s 2 1/2 hours long but I was far too restless in the final forty-five minutes or so to give it a strong recommendation. It’s also a tough watch in general – the kind of film you should go into knowing full well you’re going to see some brutal things done to people in the name of the law. And just a general sense of tension and fear that the movie only lets up in order to give you a sense of despair and sadness. Worth seeing, just be prepared.
Score: 82