“Roman J. Israel, Esq.” had piqued my interest around awards time, but after seeing it hit Redbox I still couldn’t bring myself to rent it. Then I ran across it on one of the movie channels the other day and gave it a watch.
I’m confused as to why this movie got made. That’s a strong statement, but let me clarify: I’m not strictly speaking of movie quality. After seeing a trailer for the film, I thought “Oh, another ‘based on a true story’ movie featuring Denzel Washington; that might be good.”
“Roman J. Israel, Esq.” (2017)
Director: Dan Gilroy
Writer: Dan Gilroy
Stars: Denzel Washington, Colin Farrell, Carmen Ejogo
So while watching, I thought they were portraying the main character poorly. He is fairy neurotic, weird, etc. I wondered how the real Roman Israel felt about it. Once the film was over, I Googled the name to find out more about the real story … turns out THERE IS NO REAL ROMAN ISRAEL! Knowing that, I dropped my ranking one full point.
The movie feels like a poor attempt at telling the story of someone who did something of note. If Israel was a real person, and the result of his work had an impact, this would have made more sense, but finding out it is a fictional drama blew me away.
On to the good and bad of the movie itself.
- It’s boring. Not a lot happens through the two-hour film. If it was 1:30 instead, it might have come across better.
- Roman refers to some backstory that is never explored. In one scene we see pictures of what we assume is the 1970s, maybe Black Panther protests, etc., but that’s it. Otherwise we are left listening to the character refer to these “times” yet never let us in on why he feels the way he does.
- Denzel gives a fine performance as always. I think he does what he can with the character, yet it doesn’t stand out.
- The overall message that the writer is trying for is good, it just isn’t worth waiting for.
Do yourself a favor and skip this film.