Movie Review - John Henry

The title comes from the name of one of the most famous African-American folk legends. Numerous published works like plays, books and novels have been made, but not many live-action films or TV shows. The legend is about a black man from West Virginia in the late 19th century. Director and co-writer Will Forbes in his feature debut took the elements of that folk legend and infused it into a modern-day tale of inner city life, specifically in South Central Los Angeles. Forbes' film is essentially a parable against gun violence and gang activity. Unfortunately, the film can't do that without resorting to violent acts of its own. It looks down on gun violence and gang violence, as it should, but other forms of violence, particularly with the titular character's iconic hammer, are encouraged. Forbes seemingly wants to have his cake and eat it too by having his protagonist be opposed to killing in certain circumstances or merciful here-and-there but not consistently.

Terry Crews (Brooklyn Nine-Nine and Everybody Hates Chris) stars as John Henry. Before Crews started acting in the early 2000's, he worked as a NFL player and has the physique of a tall bodybuilder, so he absolutely has the right look for this character. Crews has mostly done comedies and he has a charm to match, but this film saps all that charm away. He's mostly a gentle giant here, except when called upon at the end to be more aggressive. Until then, he's more passive and sensitive. He was perhaps mostly like this, even as a child, but when he was a teenager, he was a gang member. Yet, a tragic, personal incident forced him out of the gang and into a more passive and sensitive life.

Ken Foree (Dawn of the Dead and Kenan & Kel) co-stars as Benjamin James Henry or BJ, the father to John Henry. He's also a former gang member. Given his age and given his being in a wheelchair, obviously BJ is out of that life. He lives with his son and apparently both of them live alone. Neither have a significant other. One can assume that BJ has outlived his significant other, meaning John's mother, but maybe not. Forbes' film introduces us to BJ with home videos from the 90's. He's young and engaging, vivacious and cocky. He's still very much that personality, but the film doesn't do much to fill the gap between then and now.

We can assume based on a couple of things shown why John Henry is living the rather solitary and isolated life that he's living. However, a bit more filling out of the gap for John Henry would've been appreciated. One can imagine that he's been mostly quiet and with his head down, presumably for the better part of 30 years. However, John feels sidelined for what's supposed to be his story. It seems as if Forbes wants to make John Henry akin to a John Rambo but Rambo from the the most recent films with a little bit of John McClane from the Die Hard franchise. Unfortunately, Forbes doesn't make him as interesting or give him as much interesting things to do. It's exacerbated with the lacking of good, action scenes.

Joseph Julian Soria (Gentefied and Army Wives) plays Emilio, a young Latino living in the same neighborhood as John Henry. He too has some gang affiliation. He might do some drug dealing. He certainly has access to weapons. It's not clear if he were born and raised in Los Angeles, but he has siblings who are living in Honduras who wind up on his doorstep one day. He tries to take care of them, but his sister, Berta, played by Jamila Velazquez (Empire and Twisted), is kidnapped and is forced into sex trafficking. Emilio then does what he can to protect her from the gangsters who want to prostitute her against her will.

When both of them cross paths with John Henry, he takes it upon himself to help them, especially the young girl, Berta. From that point, the whole thing could have progressed like Denzel Washington in The Equalizer (2014). However, Forbes sets up John as a guy who wants to avoid violence, especially violence as a solution to the problem, unlike everyone else. The situation literally backs him into a corner where he almost has no choice but to use violence in return, but the film keeps testing him on that. Yet, John keeps making the violent and deadly choice.

Like John Wick (2014), this is a film where the police don't exist and aren't really a factor, which makes some sense, but John's position becomes untenable otherwise. Forbes' script doesn't make it that much of a struggle for John either. The image of him walking down the sidewalk in South Central, dragging a sledgehammer behind him seems almost destined. This would be fine, if the film found more clever action scenes in which he yielded that hammer. It's not as if I wanted him to become Chris Hemsworth in Thor (2011), even though rapper Ludacris (Fast Five and Crash) feels like he's playing a character here ripped right out of a comic book. No, I just wanted the climax to be a little more exciting and it's not.

Rated R for strong bloody violence, pervasive language, sexual references and some drug use.
Running Time: 1 hr. and 31 mins.

Available on Netflix.