Review of Clemency, directed by Chinonye Chukwu

If you’re new here, and stumbled upon this blog through the mythical powers of the Internet, welcome! I know a lot of visitors to my website are people who randomly come upon this website through search engines like Google, but I also do have a lot of visitors who come back. Regardless: my name is Ashley, and I started this blog in order to keep track of everything I’m coming across in the world.

I recently fell into a spell of unemployment probably during the worst time to be unemployed, as it was very hard to find a job. I was applying to hundreds of jobs, getting interviews, but no offer was manifesting for me in the near future. So during this time, I had a lot of free time, and spent a good chunk of it chipping away at the blog.

I also really wanted to use this time to figure out what movies I hadn’t seen throughout the years, especially when I was working as a film critic. I used to do this professionally at an online outlet, but because I was watching so many movies for work, I kind of lost the aspect of watching movies for fun in my own personal life.

Clemency was a movie that I have been meaning to watch for the longest time, as I interviewed Chinonye Chukwu at the New York Film Festival a few years back for my job. I was doing the press for Till, and I always remember how empty that room was at the press screenings compared to the Baumbach film that was debuting at the same festival. I really enjoyed talking to Chinonye then, but I remember being disheartened by how the room wasn’t full.

I was really interested in championing BIPOC cinema, especially films made by Black women, so that was partially why I ended up working more on the blog. This space is dedicated largely to BIPOC and international cinema because we’re often told, even when working at an outlet, that covering these kinds of subjects doesn’t make money.

While this website doesn’t generate a full-time income for me, it does cover its expenses through the little ads, and I get to watch movies like Clemency as a part of my routine. It’s been a great journey, even if it hasn’t been the best financially, especially with AI taking over.

I can tell I’m rambling now—let’s get into the review of this film! I watched it through Kanopy, which is one of my free services I get through my local library system.

A warden grapples with her job, and the executions she supervises, with a case garnering publicity.

This movie focuses on the perspective of one warden at a prison: Bernadine Williams. At the start of the movie, she’s supervising the execution of an inmate at the prison alongside the prison’s chaplain David. But when the medical official who’s doing the execution can’t find a vein, he starts visibly panicking and alarming everyone in the room.

He can’t seem to find the right vein to put the needle in, and he doesn’t know what to do. Bernadine then steps in and tells him to put it in the femoral vein, but this proves to be a poor decision as it leaves the dying inmate in an incredible amount of pain. His heart eventually stops, but this session proves to be quite inhumane on so many different levels.

Bernadine leaves and continues her job the same way she always has. The next inmate next up for execution is Anthony Woods, who denies he ever did anything wrong. Whenever Bernadine goes to see him, he refuses to speak to her as well, which makes sense as his lawyer has been fighting for his freedom the entire time he has been in there.

It’s through that lawyer Bernadine discovers Anthony lost his case and will be up for execution. We also learn that Bernadine’s job is seriously taking a toll on her mental health, as she no longer is able to sleep well without having some form of nightmares. She begins drinking to cope with the situation, which leads to tension with her husband, as he wants her to quit and leave all of this behind.

He does end up leaving her after a big fight on their anniversary, and he exits to a nearby motel to grapple with what just happened. Back at the prison, Anthony learns he’s become a father with one of his ex-girlfriends, who comes to visit him in prison.

Turns out she hid their son from him all this time and raised him with another man because of how difficult it was to break to the kid that his father is on death row. She knows this is it for him and offers him to see their child before he dies.

His lawyer doesn’t stop fighting though, and he goes on television and tries to file more appeals to stop the execution. Bernadine goes to the Chaplain and asks him to believe in Anthony, and while her own husband comes home and tries to make amends with her, she still bottles everything up inside of her in an unhealthy way.

Anthony’s ex-girlfriend and son do not show up on the day of his execution, and Bernadine tries to call her and see what happened. The Chaplain and his lawyer try to tell Anthony everything will be okay, but then a phone call breaks their hope: the state will not offer him clemency. He is then led to the execution room.

He is asked for his final statement, and Anthony decides to speak to the people he was accused of murdering. He says he is sorry for what happened to them, but he did not do what the world is saying what he did. His speech ends with him thanking the Chaplain and his lawyer for everything, and he is then killed.

Bernadine breaks down watching all of this, unable to keep the stoic face she had done with prior executions.

Overall Thoughts

This is quite the heartbreaking movie for both of the main characters (Anthony and Bernadine), even though a lot of Bernadine’s turmoil is internal. She does not verbalize the suffering she goes through because of her job, but, at the same time, she’s unable to walk away from everything she’s done in the prison.

A lot of loaded social commentary is packed into this story as well in a subtle way, especially when we consider Anthony’s story and how he asserts he is innocent until the end. There’s nothing in the film to suggest that he did actually do what he did—or at least that’s how I interpreted it. I wanted to know more about him, but our time together unfortunately had to come to an end.

I can see why this is the film that put Chukwu on the map originally, and while many people did not want to watch the Emmett Till movie because of its content, I could see her signature tenderness in this film as well. In watching Till and interviewing her, she told me was tired of seeing Black suffering, especially Black men.

This is a movie where we see just that, and it was her debut film. But, at the same time, there’s so much humanity in this movie, and it’s heartbreaking when we see a moment like when Anthony is denied the chance to see his son for the first and last time.

Go watch this one if you’re interested and haven’t already. I think it’s worth watching at least once in your lifetime. Movies aren’t meant to be read about; they should be experienced.

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