IndieWire has seen the movie we’ve all been told to be patient about and hold off from judging, and, um, the news isn’t very good for director Roland Emmerich. Apparently it’s just as terrible as we thought. And THEN SOME. A few choice excerpts below:
Emmerich reimagines the storied New York riots that ignited the queer rights movement with a cast of characters amalgamated from different real-life figures (with a few key exceptions) and some conjured purely from the depths of his imagination. The result of this fictional history has already ruffled a few feathers with advocacy groups peeved that the film frames a group of gay men as the leaders of a revolution started by trans women of color. While Emmerich’s intentions may be pure, he lacks the delicacy, intelligence, and skill to do right by a premise rife with potential for disaster — a topic in which the man is all too well-versed.
The thick blanket of badness that covers the entirety of the film doesn’t do its problematic subtextual politics any favors, either. At the very least, Emmerich can hold his head high in the knowledge that he wasn’t responsible for the astonishingly thick script — that distinction belongs to Jon Robin Baitz, the pen behind such stirring moments as one during the climactic riot, in which our hero raises his fist to the heavens and screams “GAY POWER!” Come to think of it, that’s really what most of the film feels like: a fist shoved in a face and words howled into ears. The insulting obviousness with which characters make declarations about the Change That Must Come and the Injustice That Has Been Suffered For Too Long strip the film of any potential for resonant poignance with its intended audience. Emmerich’s freedom fighters speak not like human beings, but political mouthpieces designed to express the simplest ideas for the simplest-minded audiences.
Those of us who thought we’d never miss Emmerich’s days of stewing up overproduced cataclysm-pornography have been roundly bested by this combination of falsehood and shameless feel-goodery. If “Stonewall” is what it means for Emmerich to make an artist’s statement, please, for the love of god, someone start setting up dynamite charges around the Seven Wonders of the World so that he might return to his wheelhouse.
Pretty bleak, huh. Still… I’m sure there will be readers out there who will urge us to not to listen to reviewers and decide for ourselves, so until the movie comes out, let’s continue to reserve judgement, I suppose.
Read the entire review at Indie.wire.
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