Are You With Us?: Monster's Ball
By Ryan Mazie
March 11, 2013
BoxOfficeProphets.com
With an impressive career marred by critical and box office bombs after being the first African-American to win a Best Actress Oscar statue, Berry doesn’t look like she is doing much to help herself with the paint-by-numbers WWE-backed thriller hitting theaters this weekend, The Call. In honor of the film, I decided to look back at the highlight of Berry’s career – Monster’s Ball.
Don’t get me wrong. I like Berry. She starred in Cloud Atlas, one of my favorite films of last year, turned in solid performances in the underrated Gothika and Things We Lost in the Fire, and played one of the hottest Bond girls in Die Another Day. Yet everything between those projects has been lacking (*ahem* Catwoman, Perfect Stranger, New Year’s Eve, Dark Tide *ahem*).
I have never seen Berry’s Oscar-winning turn in Monster’s Ball before, so as I started to stream the film, I did not know what to expect. At first very off-putting, Monster’s Ball has a strange way of making your skin crawl before digging its way underneath it.
The film is over brimming with tragedies to the point where it becomes a bit eye rolling. A racist father. A soon-to-be-executed father. An obese son. An evicted mother. A death of a child. A loveless father-son relationship. A son’s suicide. A hit-and-run. And all of this is even before the halfway point.
Billy Bob Thorton stars as Hank Grotowkski, a corrections officer along with his son, Sonny (Heath Ledger), at a local prison. Living under the same roof with Hank’s racist widowed grandfather (Peter Boyle), the hardened and hate-filled household is shaken up once Sonny commits suicide.
In another crumbling family situation, Leticia (Halle Berry) faces eviction from her house as she struggles to raise her obese son she abuses after her husband is sent to the electric chair.
Picking up another job at a local diner, Leticia meets Hank and the two start a sex-driven affair.
Monster’s Ball chronicles the two lonely leads who have little likability as they start a relationship (Hank tries to withhold his participation in Leticia’s husband execution) while their fortunes continue to worsen.
Dark and dreary and fairly hopeless, Monster’s Ball made me want to turn off the TV about 30 minutes in. I do not mind films with dark overtones, but I do not care for movies that are exercises in one-upping tragedy for a tear-stained ending. However, about halfway through when Hank and Leticia start their romance, the film starts to spark.
Produced by Precious helmer Lee Daniels and directed by Marc Forster (Quantum of Solace, Stranger than Fiction), the southern-set drama is disturbingly intimate. There is no wall dividing the viewer from the characters on screen. This is most apparent in the much-talked about Berry-Thorton alcohol and sadness fueled sex scene that throws the rule of less being more right out the window.
What makes the film a critical (yet overrated) hit, holding at 85% on RottenTomatoes.com, is the stellar cast. There is not a weak performance in the bunch. Heath Ledger is excellent as the fatherly-love seeking son. Cast in the role at the last minute after Wes Bentley dropped out, Ledger makes the most out of his limited screen time. Sean "P. Diddy" Combs and first-and-last time child actor Coronji Calhoun make excellent headway too in roles that are cut off short by death. Boyle immediately sheds his comedic image in the racist father role, finding depth in what could have easily have been a one-note supporting role.
However, it is clear that Thorton and especially Berry own this movie.
Thorton is given the less showy of the lead roles, played with a stoic stance and short sentences. Berry runs the emotional gamut, shedding tears and glowering in anger, sometimes in the same scene. Bringing stability to a character that could easily go into the territory of mad woman in the hands of a lesser actress, Berry gives her all (and shows all – something that made Vanessa Williams turn down the part) and has been awarded handsomely.
While I said I think the film has been overblown in terms of quality over the years (the fairly low IMDb rating of a 7.1 for an awards season film goes to show there is some dissent), the performances still stand.
One of the biggest benefactors from Monster’s Ball’s success was first-time theatrical-release director Foster, who got offered much bigger opportunities afterward. Ledger also got to showcase his more dark and dramatic side in his still burgeoning filmography. Thorton and Berry were already established by the time the film’s release, with Monster's Ball adding more acclaim to their awards repertoire. Berry’s historic Oscar win arguably brought her career to an even higher level, one that took a sharp dive three years later with the release of Catwoman along with other flops and some straight-to-DVD affairs. Her inability of not being able to live up to her Oscar gold has become comedic fodder.
Released by Lionsgate (when they used to release quality independent films, before becoming the house that Saw and Tyler Perry built), Monster's Ball quickly became their highest grosser and put them on the map.
Opening the last weekend of December to qualify for the Oscars, it wasn’t until the second weekend of February that the film opened into a significant number of theaters (342 locations). Never reaching the top 10, Monster’s Ball quietly added to its total throughout the awards season, playing in over 300 theaters even in May. When all was calculated, Monster’s Ball earned a very respectable $31.3 million ($44.5 million today) against a budget of $4 million.
While the film garnered controversy about its racist characters and the idea of a black woman needing a “white savior”, I did not find any of these elements offensive. Much like the ire surrounding last year’s Django Unchained, these elements aren’t glamorized but dissected. While not as subtle as it thinks, Monster's Ball examines racism and peels it back.
A slow-burn drama, this modern sticky southern gothic film is compelling if you can get past the initial stages. Not a perfect plot, Monster’s Ball is a master’s class in acting, seeing performers rise above complicated roles instead of being crushed by them.
Verdict: With Us
7 out of 10