REVIEW: ‘A FALL FROM GRACE’ A FALL FROM INTELLIGENCE

LIAM EASLEY, TRUMPET A&E EDITOR

Tyler Perry wrote, directed and produced the drama/thriller “A Fall from Grace.” It ended up being a large misstep in Perry’s career. Netflix released the film on Jan. 17.

Ironically, “A Fall from Grace” started with a woman jumping off a building. The film then followed the story of Jasmine, a novice lawyer who took a client about to plead guilty. The client, named Grace, was convicted of murdering her husband, Shannon.

The film took on an alternate narrative of Grace meeting her husband and how her new spouse would treat her, and he treated her in a way that would spawn enough contempt required for murder.

In order to describe the magnitude of this movie’s flaws, this paragraph will contain spoilers. After bludgeoning his head with a baseball bat several times and throwing him down the basement steps in a fashion that would have broken his neck, the antagonist still managed to get away in a pathetic attempt of a plot twist. Regardless of a poorly executed turn of events, there were problems with the characters as well.

Jasmine, for example, has a very odd character trait. It seems that she, as a lawyer that went through years of schooling, is morally against defending murderers, as if it is not what she has signed up for. Not only this, but she ends up defending Grace, a woman who plead guilty. It is a truly interesting character arc.

Not only this, but when she defended Grace in court, she made it clear that she was innocent. The scene of the crime did not have a body, but it had plenty of blood, according to Grace’s friend, Sarah.

In other words, the police would have known from the DNA test that it was from Grace’s husband, Shannon. Outside of bad characters and plot holes, the film also had a weak script and bad special effects.

There is a scene with fireflies that looked like a Snapchat filter. Of course, there were good parts of the film, such as how successful the movie was at making Shannon look like the worst husband. There is an emotional pull in that regard, something that a lot of movies fail to achieve.

Among other decent moments, the film had potential. However, it is smothered in bad characters, plot holes and forced drama. In the end, it is a pointless film that had too many flaws for it to be taken seriously.

It could have been better if the plot was cleaned up and the drama was not exaggerated, but this is the final product, and it proved that Perry needed to move away from drama and thriller films for the time being.