2008
"Explicit Ills" is a trite, limp mess of a film that reminded me of "Do The Right Thing" done all wrong.
Both films followed various interweaving inner-city stories, building toward a climax that links them all together.
Though stylishly done, "Do The Right Thing" felt like a real lived-in environment.
"Explicit Ills" seemed like it was written by someone who drove through a rough neighborhood one afternoon. The characters are both cliche and unrealistic.
The poorer characters somehow have eating healthy as a higher priority than earning a living. One of the little boys is vegan... yet his surroundings show there's no way his family could afford that lifestyle.
The richer, gentrified neighbors (both black and white) also want to eat healthy, get colon cleansers and the like... yet counter these choices with drugs and alcohol. We've seen that people with money are hypocrites hundreds of times.
The film also has an unrealistic subplot of kindness to strangers. Anyone who's ever lived in an inner city environment knows people would barely look another in the eye, let alone help them. It's a cynical reaction on my part but... one of the (poor) boys wants to stop being bullied, so he buys the bully a new pair of Nike shoes. (as if)
People hand out free fruits and vegetables to the poor... but it's not just your standard lettuce, apples, oranges and the like... the exotic produce looks like they just raided a ritzy Whole Foods Supermarket instead of the cans of creamed corn that would normally be donated to a food bank. There are more examples of this unrealistic schmaltz, but I won't bore you.
"Do The Right Thing" built tension up all along that erupted into a riot that expressed the simple fact that the Civil Rights Movement didn't end racism.
"Explicit Ills" dully plods along until it ends in a march for healthcare.
I am a firm believer in the need for universal healthcare, but the film tackled the subject so poorly that an undecided intelligent viewer might even turn against it if they could see through its phony manipulative facade.
As a director, Mark Webber gets uniformly strong performances from the cast and the cinematography, etc. are well done... but with such an amateur afterschool special-worthy script, the film never climbs out of the dumpster it was written in.
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