Halfway into Repentance, Angel (Forest Whitaker) confines self-help guru Tommy Carter (Anthony Mackie) and covers him in plastic wrap. This invokes the juicy question, “can Anthony Mackie, literally, act his way out of a plastic bag?” The answer, sadly and hilariously is, “no.”
There’s only one good reason to see Repentance – for the acting of Forest Whitaker as an imbalanced man battling between reality and paranormal. Angel is tormented by the ghost of his murdered mother and seeks Tommy’s help for recovery. Or at least that’s the premise. Given that drunken brothers Tommy and Ben (Mike Epps) joy-collide with a “somebody” before the opening credits, well, gee, this is quite the mystery, isn’t it? The screenplay is mostly a cat-and-mouse game between Angel and Tommy; Tommy thinks Angel needs closure while Angel has a different agenda.
Wait a sec. “Angel Sanchez,” really? Forest Whitaker is playing a man named “Angel Sanchez?!” What? No “Sven Nordquist,” “Ian O’Callahan,” or “Chao Ling?”
The Angel/Tommy interaction has surprisingly little plot consequence. I believe the scenes exist for the audience to discover exactly how much better an actor Forest Whitaker is compared to Anthony Mackie. To put it kindly, it’s like LeBron James playing one-on-one with The Hamburglar. This is where the screenplay should have shone – Tommy wants to cure Angel; Angel wants to know Tommy’s involvement in his mother’s death. But the scenes come off unresolved and flat. Once Tommy is tied up, he needs to use the psychology
of the situation to his advantage, but instead he screams for a half-hour.
The screenplay wasn’t exactly a winner before this moment. Forest Whitaker’s copy of Tommy’s book is overworn, as if it had been read over and over and over again, which, given the 20-minute real time segment between discovery and meeting the author is pretty stupid. Oh and let’s not forget Mike Epps makes everything worse. Don’t know how, don’t know why, but he does – consistently and eternally. Want your movie to suck? Invite Mike Epps along. Tommy ends up taking on Angel as a patient to pay a debt for Ben. When the time comes, Ben is petulant, rejecting the money and riding off. Oh, he only existed to support the flimsy premise of getting Angel and Tommy together. Quality writing there, fellas.
Speaking of quality writing, the conclusion to Repentance is the very worst in 2014 cinema. Yes, I know we’re only in March and yet I’m 100% confident I’ll be able to repeat this line when 2014 concludes. It isn’t satisfying; it resolves while leaving huge holes; it doesn’t even make sense from a physical point of view. I’d give it away except I respect my readership too much –not to spoil it? Hah! You wish – but not to subject them to pondering it for even five seconds.
Upset by the death of his mother
Angel has issues to smother
He captures one or two
Interrogation fu
A jackass and kin? O brother
Rated R, 90 Minutes
D: Philippe Caland
W: Shintaro Shimosawa, Philippe Caland
Genre: “Psychological” “mystery”
Type of person most likely to enjoy this film: Forest Whitaker junkies
Type of person least likely to enjoy this film: Actual believers in acts of repentance
