Precious has been lauded with praise since its debut at Sundance this year and considered a front runner for Best Picture for a while now, and while I don’t quite agree with that assessment the film is still a well made drama about overcoming your obstacles in life no matter how hard they come.
Precious is a sixteen year old girl pregnant with her second child, both fathered by her own father, living in an abusive home with her mother, and while intelligent lacks in her abilities to actually show her smarts. It’s funny that this film goes pretty much nationwide in a limited release the same day as the similarly themed The Blind Side as they send the same message but told at almost completely different ends of the spectrum. In The Blind Side, things are hard off for our main focus, but as he moves on and gets better, good things seem to happen, where as Precious takes one step forward and then something tries to knock her ten steps back.
The film piles it on and is relentless with obstacle after obstacle thrown at her. Everything horrible that you could probably imagine happens to this poor girl, but she keeps moving forward in this ultimately tragic tale. I won’t go into her hurdles as it is quite spoilery, but expect the worse. That isn’t to say that there aren’t some lighter points in this film though, and while they might be few and far between, they offer some nice moments of levity to a film that is constantly pulling you down. Almost every character gives you a moment where you can get behind them and there progress, but also will shake your head in sadness at something else about their lives that might be even out of their hands. The only character in the film that is mostly unaffected and leading a normal life is Precious’ teacher Ms. Rain; unless you are a republican. [Read more...]