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The Best of Enemies

2019

Robin Bissell

Taraji P. Henson, Sam Rockwell, Anne Heche, Wes Bentley ...

6.7

1,414

Drama The film centers friendship between Ann Atwater (Henson), an outspoken black activist, and Claiborne Paul Ellis (Rockwell), a ranking member of the Ku Klux Klan, both of whom lived in Durham, N.C., in the turbulent 1960s civil rights era.

	Author	Review
United States	Owen Gleiberman Variety	"A rock-solid movie: squarely deliberate, a little long and predictable, but honest and thoughtful enough, precise in its period and locale, with very strong performances."	POS
United States	A. O. Scott The New York Times	"The facts of the story (...) are eye-opening and inspiring (...) Bissell lurches from folksy comedy to clattering melodrama, producing the opposite of enlightenment."	NEU
United States	David Ehrlich IndieWire	"There’s an undercurrent of honesty to the story that it tells, even if there’s something a bit skewed about how that story is told (...) [It] is shaped with an arresting sense of balance"	NEU
United States	Caryn James The Hollywood Reporter	"While it lacks the ambition to turn its obvious plot into a film that feels new, it also avoids the pitfalls of moral smugness and stereotyping (...) It flows along easily"	POS
United Kingdom	Tim Grierson Screendaily	"Taraji P. Henson and Sam Rockwell maintain their dignity, but writer-director Robin Bissell’s formulaic examination of bigotry, class and family succumbs to cliché early and often."	NEU
United States	Mark Jenkins The Washington Post	"[It] skillfully follows the uplift-movie formula. But that doesn’t make its scenario any less irksome (...) [Bissell] has crafted an effective mainstream entertainment (...) But subtlety is not in his repertoire (…) Rating: ★★½ (out of 4)"	NEU
United States	Katie Walsh Seattle Times	"Bissell has needlessly manipulated the real story. Reading the Wikipedia page is far more moving than anything in the disjointed film (…) Rating: ★½ (out of 4)"	NEG
United States	Candice Frederick The Wrap	"It’s reductive, despite the film’s claims to the contrary (...) Both lead performances, despite the mundane narrative, are solid"	NEU
United States	Richard Brody The New Yorker	"Bissell relies on Bloom’s documentary, and the real people in it, to lend an air of authenticity to a story that he has freely changed in ways that downplay the controversies"	NEU
United States	Sara Stewart New York Post	"Henson does an admirable job (...) A 2002 documentary, 'An Unlikely Friendship,' offers a more illuminating look at this surprising chapter in history (…) Rating: ★★ (out of 4)"	NEU

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