Diving head-first into current race relations is not the easiest subject matter to choose, but directorCarlos López Estradaand writers/starsDaveed DiggsandRafael Casalare doing so fearlessly. Their filmBlindspottingfollows Diggs' character Collin, who is just a few days away from the end of his probation after a year in prison. He reconnects with his childhood best friend Miles (Casal) in Oakland, where the two work together, but Miles' penchant for trouble threatens Collin’s probational status. When Collin then witnesses an office-involved shooting of a young, unarmed black man, things get even more complicated.
Adam Chitwood gave the film afavorable reviewwhen he screened it at Sundance, saying in part,
“Tackling so much in a debut feature could have been a disaster, but for the most part Lopez pulls it off while also announcing himself as a filmmaker to watch. There’s aDo the Right Thingvibe to the film that’s unmistakable, and while Spike Lee‘s masterpiece is unmatched,Blindspottingcould in some ways be considered aDo the Right Thingfor 2018 […] The vivaciousness of the filmmaking keeps the film moving and cracking even as it tackles heady issues, and Diggs and Casal do a phenomenal job of navigating the varying tones of the film. They can go big and funny—this movie is often downright hilarious—but as the film gets darker (both literally and figuratively, as Lopez starts to pull back on the bright colors in the third act), Diggs and Casal rise to the occasion, bringing even more layers to their performances.”
Chitwood also adds that if you think you know where things are going with this film, you don’t; it’s “a film that could easily have taken the traditional narrative routes, but the story consistently swerves left when you think it’s going to go right.”
Check out the trailer below.Blindspottingwill debut in select cities July 20th, and also starsJanina Gavankar,Jasmine CephasJones,Ethan Embry,Tisha Campbell-Martin,Utkarsh Ambudkar, andWayne Knight.
