The Forty-Year-Old Version

GRADE: B-

THIS FILM IS RECOMMENDED.

IN BRIEF: A flawed but intriguing look at an artist's journey.

JIM'S REVIEW: Artists are often told to make art based on what you know and that sage advice is exactly what Radha Blank did in her autobiographical indie debut entitled The Forty-Year-Old Version. This engaging comedy, filmed mostly in b&w and on a the smallest of budgets, depicts an artist's journey with many interesting characters and stops along the way.

Ms. Blank directs, writes, and stars here, making an impressive triple-threat debut. She plays Radha, a struggling playwright unable to find success she drifts into the world of hiphop, her real passion. A 30 year-old prodigy, Radha has gone nowhere in these past ten years, except for her teaching job which helps to pay the bills. As she wrestles with self-doubt and depression, her latest artistic project improbably gets green-lighted for Broadway. This contrived plot device leads her and moviegoers to this question: Will the artist stay true to her own vision or sell out? It's a fictitious version of herself and any artist's on-going dilemma. Ms. Blank uses her real life experiences and unique talents to convey those two conflicting worlds quite effectively.

As an actress, she is a commanding screen presence with some droll comic timing. Her screenplay creates an authentic world, one step from poverty and living off the gritty streets of Harlem. Her dialog has sparks of insight and wit. However, her depiction of her Caucasian characters in the film is slightly offensive though humorous. There is a a reverse Uncle Tomism subtly on display as these white stereotype characters become mere bobbleheads, walking cliches of ineptitude and silliness who are out of touch with the world and more concerned about their white privilege. In her directorial debut, Ms. Blank establishes her narrative well, but lets too many scenes go on past their expiration date, including a rap smackdown sequences that honors the craft but adds little to the story. The movie felt padded with too much attention to atmosphere and not enough on the plot structure. A shorter film version itself or more judicious editing by the filmmaker could have made the movie have greater impact.

Peter Kim as her gay friend/agent Archie and Oswin Benjamin as D, her rapper friend and muse, provide strong support as does Reed Birney as J. Whitman, in a thankless role as the pompous producer of her play.

The Forty-Year-Old Version is as crude and raw as its profane language and liberal use of n-words, but there is much to say and hear from a promising and gifted artist. One looks forward to her next project.

Radka is a playwright who has somewhat fallen from grace since her first success and as she approaches 40 is having a sort of mid-life crisis - what is she about? What's it all for? How can she become fulfilled? Well - indefatigable, she goes about setting herself up as a rapper and it becomes quite clear to "D" - the young base track layer that she has some skill at it. He even presuades her to do a live gig so perhaps her rather hum-drum, routine, existence might be about to change for the better... ? Well, simultaneously her agent "Archie" (Peter Kim) is trying to get the rather seedy, gay casting-couch merchant "J Whitman" (Reed Birney) to produce her play and the film juggles her rapping and writing aspirations set against her day-job teaching a disparate bunch of students with attitude and talent - but both need to be controlled! At it's best, this is great - the rapping is potent and poetic; the comedy can be funny - if somewhat predictable; and she is an engaging and likeable character. It is, however, far too long and auteur Blank struggles to maintain the pace and focus of the film for much of what just turns out to be a fairly ordinary tale of a single woman trying to recalibrate. I enjoyed it, but it really could have been doing with a more objective hand at the helm.

This movie is absolutely fantastic. It may be 2 hours long but it felt like 1 hour 20. Charming and amusing from start to finish. Really good comedic acting, great direction, full of brilliant one liners and if this was the 90s I'd be buying that OST on cd. 100% a must watch.

Wow, am I really leaving the first review? This movie made me laugh (a lot, lots of giggles) and made me think. On a universal level, there are so few movies that address the humor and pains of being 40 (The 30 yos get all the fun) so, anyone who is about to turn 40 will find something to relate to in this movie. But on another level, it made me think about what being a black female playwright and poet is like (I'm a white dude), and did so in a way that made me laugh and feel uncomfortable at the same time. That's a rare quality and I feel like a better human being today for it. So, in short - LOVED IT.

I very much enjoyed this movie. The female lead, who also wrote and directed the movie, tells a funny if sad story of a middle-aged black playwright who cannot get her works produced until she finally agrees to sell out and rewrite one of her works to make it conform to the East Side white liberal view of what Harlem must be like. (Imagine the world of New York East Side pseudo-intellectuals that Woody Allen has been lampooning for decades.) Her compromised play succeeds - with an audience of white East Side intellectuals - and then she has to decide where to go from there.

There are wonderful scenes in this movie. There were others that didn't hold me.

I wish more time could have been devoted to how the original play was changed/compromised during rehearsals.

Still, I definitely recommend this movie.