American Fiction Film Review

 American Fiction ...Film Review 

Directed by Cord Jefferson

Based on novel ERASURE by Percival Everett 

Jeffery wright in lead role 

OTT Amazon Prime

Nominated for 2024 Oscars for 

Best picture,

Best actor,

Best supporting actor,

Best adapted screenplay

Best original score .

When I was browsing for good films I chanced on American fiction .

Though in beggining I had every mind to stop I persisted ,slowly it revealed itself to be a good film .

Monk the protaganist is a middle aged doctorate in literature and professor in an university ,Divorced and a black American .

He is a writer too with books in his name though none were famous were appreciated for their complexity  ,style and vocabulary but both ratings and awards and commerical succeses kept away from him .

Monk was not one to pander to liberal Americas political conscience on blacks in a superficial way  and a snobbish acceptance of them ,thier way of life and thier writings in an accepted mode like for eg a dog to a dog lover .

He wanted his writing to rise above such barriers of colour or race and not stick to the sterotypes of blacks in his novels .

Forced to take a sabbatical on his visit to Boston to see his mother suffering from increasing dementia his sister a Gynaecologist and brother though a plastic surgeon a selfish freak  junky and a gay .

With unexpected death of his sister he realises he needs to pay the bills for his mothers costly care home as his brother just drifts apart .

Monk sees that other American black writers succumbing to the groove of white publishing worlds rules are commercial sucesses and suffer no financial strains .

He also realises the quality of those writings are way below but they get the film offers of story ,and awards .

So one day when frustrated he justs starts writing a novel like them and finishes it at one go naming it My Pafology ,he has no hopes it would see the light of day 

He pens it under a fictious name of an ex convict  as he is embarassed to write a stereotype black novel with cuss words ,accent and tone of such a person 

But his agent feels it would be a sucess .

He comes to know from him later that a very big publisher was keen to buy it at a big price ,

Monk  tries to dissuade them over phone by acting tough telling them he wants title to change as FUCK  to the shock of his agent !

Strangely the publishers agree to that too 

Soon a weird film maker loves it and buys it at an astronomical price .

As Monk needs the money he accepts all offers .

Funnily he becomes part of a jury for a book award and his own FUCK novel is nominated 

He keeps quiet and talks against his novel getting award telling its too vulgar and grotesque .

But the rest of jury selects the book for the award carrying big prize money .

Monk comes to know sucess was assured by his changing stance and pandering to percieved popular tastes and not when he stuck to ideals 

He finally walks to dias when award is announced and the organisers telling author could not be contacted

He confesses to audience that he was the author .

Though it deals with writing and publishing it touches on fact sucess does not mean qauality or righteous ness it could be the opposite

Akshardam temple New jersey

It was a snowy rainy cold day in New Jersey today ( yesterday night for India ) .

Shyam had told me weather is bad in weekend so we will have to postpone our outings to a weekday .

Since he needs to be in his research work in University of Rutger and a couple of days in Manhattans Flat iron university peering at his STARS weekend would have been ideal to go out but weather was making an issue .

I had told him just one day in N York and one day for BAPS Swaminarayanan temple in

 N Jersey itself but in Robinsville which wasnt very close to New Brunswick .

America unlike India has a poor public transport system so I couldnt just hop on a bus and no train existed in this route ..

And then serendepity worked....

Paulo Coelho again proved himself right of how universal forces act at times to do thier best ,not at all times but at times only .

Chandra or Chandrasekar an young friend of mine since 2017 when I met him on another freezing trip to New york in a greyhound bus when I travelled alone from Cleaveland ,to me the young IT professional was good company to talk in the bus .

But we kept in touch ,

Later Chandra moved back to Chennai and stayed there with family ,

For last few years we were not in touch 

Last was when he arranged all help by remote control from Chennai for our trip to Sri Sailam temple through his brother in Hyderabad .

Chandra hailed from AP .

So I got a new year greeting from Chandra about his being in new jersey and If I had any plans to visit US  !!

I called Chandra and told him when I would be in NJ 

Chandra was delighted and asked my plans which I mentioned ,

He then said Uncle BAPS temple trip is my responsibilty on Saturday ,though I tried to tell him it wasnt fair for him to be spending his weekend away from his family and later about bad weather but Chandra had no excuses to change his plans .

By 2 pm Chandra drove in picking me and Shyam to a sleet driven drive to BAPS .

From taking picture in the rainy snowy slush to holding my hands so as I wouldnt slip in the snow and guiding us all around the magnificient temple Chandra guided us .

BAPS Swaminarayanan temples exist sll over world and in India ,called Akshardhams they are built by Swaminarayanan trust 

The biggest temple in the western hemisphere is  in its 185 acres in Robinsville spending 92 million dollars to build in 15 years a mind blowing work of art and Indian  temple architecture showcasing the best in Indian spirituality , tradition and heritage to the world as an object of priceless beauty ,a veritable fairy land ,a spiritual Disney world of fine creativity and efficient management the Swaminarayanan Akshardam  in Robinsville was one place no Indian should miss to see in the US of A .

Shyam and Chandra in no time became close friends and melded well .

Chandra had more plans and increasing intensity of snow only worried me ,he said Sir shall we go to Venkatachalapathi temple ? 

We put our foot down ,

So he said ok lets go to my house as Monika had prepared dinner for you both ! 

This was the surprise he kept to the end and would not listen to any excuse so we drove back in the darkening dusk in snow flurries creating eerie dark visuals .

Chandras cute children and Monika welcomed us to thier cosy home .

After some small talk and getting warm we were given an authentic Telengana Veggie dinner 

We had delicious Pesarattu dosa with peanut chutney ,Puliyodra with Avakkai pickles 

Alisanda Appa rice crackerel 

Chintaka pachadi a tamarind based chutney 

Shudh desi ghee melted over all this 

Fresh curd rice with fried green chilly to bite and finally dessert as Junnu usually made out of colostrum milk of cow made in US using its powder .

So much effort to give us a warm traditional cuisine which we obviously enjoyed .

After all this Chandra refused us to take an UBER back but drove all the way again in the by now increasing snow to drop us home .

What a treat it was !

Universe definitely conferred here making Paulo Coelho a honest writer !