Review of Fences, directed by Denzel Washington

Just as someone who watches and reads a ton of theatre, I knew what Fences was before I began to see the movie everywhere in my life. I never had the chance to read the play, although I would like to very much, as I simply have so much to read in my life and note enough time if we’re going to be frank.

My room is literally covered in book stacks, and if you follow this blog more avidly, you’ll notice how often I post book reviews because instead of looking at my phone like a ton of other people my age (and like my sister—love you girlie), I replaced that time with reading and studying.

So I read a lot more than the average 23-year-old and that means I neglect the things that don’t get into my hands quicker.

I decided to watch the movie version of Fences once it was added to Netflix. It was perfecting timing, as I had just checked out a biography of August Wilson.

At the time of writing this, I still have not had the chance to get through that biography because of my lack of time, but never fear—I’ll get to it eventually! Instead of doing my work one day, I decided to watch the movie and get my toes wet in the world of Wilson’s writing.

Let’s get into the review.

A former baseball player struggles with his family life and son’s dreams of being like him.

The protagonist of Fences is Troy, who is living in Pittsburgh during the fifties. He has a wife, Rose, and a son, Cory, who wants to be a football player. Troy works around the neighborhood as a trash collector, creating a life for himself after leaving behind a life where he was abused by his own father, and had the chance to be a professional baseball player.

However, he could never make it in the Major Leagues because he was Black and it was segregated until 1947. We also know that his younger brother Gabriel is mentally impaired due to an injury in World War II, and Troy was charging him rent until he moved across the street. Rose thinks that Gabriel might be better off in a hospital, but there’s a new kind of friction happening in the family.

Now under financial stress due to him moving out, Troy also is deeply unhappy with the fact Cory is playing football for his school. Troy gets upset, too, when his son from another relationship comes to visit and asks for money.

We know that Troy is someone who came from nothing and made a life for himself, so it upsets him when other people come to beg for money, as he thinks they, too, should work as hard as he did.

Conflict escalates when Cory doesn’t go to his job in order to go to football practices. Rose tells Troy he’s being scouted by colleges, and this is a shot to go to school and better their situation.

Troy is very against it because of how he once failed in the sports world, and Troy, after demanding Cory go back to his job, tells his coach that Cory is no longer allowed to play on the team because he needs to make money. This angers Cory greatly, and after throwing his helmet at his father, is told that he should respect his elders.

Soon after, Troy becomes the first African American garbage truck driver in the city. When his best friend discovers Troy is cheating on his wife, this leads to a different kind of snowball.

Troy owns up to his other relationship to his wife after getting the woman pregnant, and when he’s aggressive towards Rose, Cory hits him and throws him into the fence. When the baby is born and the other woman dies, Troy brings the girl to Rose, who agrees to raise her but will not allow him back in.

Cory loses the chance at a football scholarship, which means he cannot go to college. He decides to enlist in the Marine Corps, and when he’s heading home one night, he runs into a drunk Troy.

He ends up hitting Troy with a bat, and Troy asks Death to come for him, and this is the last we see of him. We’re told six years pass, and Troy dies of a heart attack. Cory comes home from the Marines, and tells his mother he won’t go to the funeral.

Rose admits to him she loved his father, despite what he did, and tells her son he is his father’s blood. Cory then talks to his little sister, and they sing a song their father used to always sing.

The other son gets to come home from jail for the funeral, Gabriel is released from the hospital, and they all decide to bid farewell to Troy. Gabriel plays his trumpet for St. Peter and opens the gates of heavens for Troy, which is something he was failing to do at the beginning of the movie.

Overall Thoughts

This is such a well-written movie, and it’s not surprising considering how well the play is done as well. There are more overt themes in a movie like this on the surface, but I what I find so magical about this is the subtext and analysis.

We know Troy doesn’t want to repeat the same cycles he grew up with as a child, but ends up falling into a similar kind of trap because it’s all he knows.

The acting is also so well done to bring all of this together, making it such a good movie experience. Sometimes theater doesn’t translate well onto the cinema scene, but this is a movie that does it so well.

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