A novelist who’s fed up with the establishment profiting from “Black” entertainment uses a pen name to write a book that propels him into the heart of hypocrisy and the madness he claims to disdain.

‘American Fiction’ is the stellar debut movie from Cord Jefferson, based on a 2001 novel from Percival Everett called ‘Erasure’ that explores the inherent bias and baggage that people bring when reading African-American literature. It is an incredibly funny satire about a frustrated novelist who writes an intentionally over the top and stereotypical ‘black’ book as a ‘fuck you’ to the industry, only to see it get published and become wildly successful – both with critics and the general public.

In one of his best performances to date, Jeffrey Wright is Thelonious ‘Monk’ Ellison, the frustrated novelist at the centre of ‘American Fiction’. We meet him as he is dealing with issues caused by his dysfunctional family, while struggling to come to terms with a career that has led to critical acclaim but not sales – a feeling I’m sure many writers have experienced at one period or another. This frustration is heightened when he exits a sparsely intended literary seminar and walks into a much better intended one by another black author – one who, in Monk’s view, has wrote a novel that panders to Black stereotypes called ‘We’s Lives in Da Ghetto’ (the titling in this movie is superb). This is the catalyst, or the final straw, that leads Monk to write a ‘piece of trash’ in his own words called ‘My Pafology’, which is a cliché ridden ‘Black’ book about broken families, drug use, cop killings and gang violence.

This is a really wonderful movie and I loved every minute of it. Not only is it laugh out loud funny, but it has its emotional moments too, with Jefferson managing the differences in tone well, aided by brilliant performances from the strong ensemble cast. Wright is of course brilliant, but he’s matched well by Leslie Uggams as his elderly mother who is suffering with Alzheimers, and Sterling K. Brown as his difficult brother Cliff, who Monk has never got along with. ‘American Fiction’ brilliantly skewers modern race relations, particularly through the cynical depictions of white individuals within the literary industry, and it’s clear director Jefferson has a strong handle on his material with plenty to say for himself through these characters.

Between this and ‘The Holdovers’, it’s great to see a couple of intelligent, funny dramas aimed at adults getting a lot of love, with both landing Best Picture Oscar nominations today. Long may it continue.

Rating: 4/5

Directed By: Cord Jefferson

Starring: Jeffrey Wright, Tracee Ellis Ross, Issa Rae, Sterling K. Brown, John Ortiz, Erika Alexander, Leslie Uggams, Adam Brody, Keith David, Okieriete Onaodowan, Raymond Anthony Thomas and Myra Lucretia Taylor

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt23561236/