Barry

So with the President having only 8 days in office until...

The Darkest Timeline begins

I thought it would be appropriate to watch a movie about said President in honor of his last days. And for those complaining that I'm politically biased, when a movie comes out in 2020 of Trump's early days where he questions his place in a world where he doesn't quite fit in with either the black community or the white community, I will definitely review it. 

Barry was a confusing film when I first saw that it was on Netflix because I really didn't get a sense of what it was supposed to be about. There was another movie that was a love story between Barrack and Michelle set in their early years of their marriage called Southside With You that came out in 2016 that made perfect sense, but Barry didn't seem to focus on that or anything recognizable in Obama's past. It just seemed to be about President Obama in his early years when people called him Barry. 

So as the movie started, I guessed that the movie was going to be about him in college making a turn towards a career in politics... but that wasn't what this movie was about either. 

Barry is set in 1981 when Barry Obama (played by Devon Terrell) comes to New York as he starts his

undergraduate at Columbia. From the beginning, Barry seems to be interested in a lot of normal things. He's an excellent student interested in philosophy and American society. He plays basketball. He dates women in that go to his school, most namely a young white woman by the name of Charlotte (played by Anya Taylor-Joy) from his political science class.

This movie mainly observed Barrack Obama as a college student in the 1980s. And you may be thinking to yourself that that sounds really boring but it actually is a very intriguing character study.

As the audience of course we start the movie seeing this kid as the future President of the United States and I think you expect more of his beginnings. You expect overt acts of racism that show a persecuted life of the young Barry Obama who would eventually rise above those trials.

And while race is a huge issue of this story, it's not the story of racism in America that you initially think it's going to be. He is definitely exposed to racism, but this story is more about the fact that Barry is half white and half black and he's trying to find the place he truly belongs in this world.

If you've read my reviews of Fruitvale Station and Crash, you'll know that I made a little bit of a comparison in those two films with their commentary on race. Both films had a very poignant point to make about racism in America but one had a heavy handed approach and the other was more subtle. Well I thought that Barry was going to have that heavy handed approach based on the first scene where he's profiled by campus police because he's black. But that part actually does come back in a really effective message. That scene and the rest of the movie is tied together really well to show the inner conflict that Barry goes through in this film and all of it together isn't played off as a future President going through a racist world, it's more the everyday dealings of a black man in New York. This character just so happens to become the President and I guess that's a good way to market the movie, but in reality, this could have been about any half white half black kid during the 1980s and it still would have been an interesting story.

The movie mainly watches Barry explore both sides of the coin that is him. He hangs out with his girlfriend and her family who are affluent white people, a society that Barry didn't experience when he was growing up and he's seen as an anomaly and he doesn't feel like he fits in. But then he goes to Harlem and hangs out with his black friends in "the hood" and he doesn't totally feel like he fits in there as well.

The movie as a whole is pretty subdued but at the same time it's really well acted and you really do care about the internal struggle he's going through and you're trying to figure out what's going his head.

Like the rest of the movie, Devon Terrell plays a very subdued young Obama. He's not trying to do an impression of him but more trying to give his own interpretation while still giving respect to a living man. The funny aspects of the film are actually when it's a little bit self aware. Like there's a part where his girlfriend asks him if he doesn't believe in change. Yeah it's a little bit cheesy and a cheap nudge to the audience but I felt like it worked in the context of the scene and gave some humor to a pretty internal and subdued movie. Another example is the impression his friend Saleem makes of him. That's actually where the voice of Obama is given a fun little nudge of mockery and it actually works pretty well.

Overall, Barry is a very small story about a young man trying to find his identity. I couldn't tell you how much of it is true but it's such a small part of the long accomplished life of Obama that it doesn't really matter, especially for how personal of a story this is.

Is it going to win any awards? Probably not. While it is a pretty nuanced look at race that also tells a personal drama of Barrack Obama, it's not overly complex. It reminds me of Fruitvale Station where it's a very personal story with a pretty poignant message and it's done well. There are times when it kind of drags, but if a story can give me a different perspective of a man who has run our country for the past 8 years, I enjoyed it for what it was. If you have an hour and a half or so and want a small but good drama, Barry is a pretty good personal story.

But those are my thoughts on Barry. What did you think? Should I be checking out Southside With You? Which one do you prefer? Comment and Discuss below! You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @cmhaugen24 as well as send me your requests for films I should review in the future. If you follow me on Twitter, you can get updates on future movie news and reviews coming out of this blog.

I'll leave you with this. I try to keep this blog as apolitical as I can, but putting all positions and beliefs aside, I am willing to put money on the idea that we will not hear a more professional, powerful, and Presidential speech than this one for at least another four years. Enjoy!