When someone dies young—especially in a tragic fashion—it can be tempting for the bereaved to reduce the deceased to little more than an angelic, idealized figure. We’re so understandably wrapped up in our grief that we focus on that person’s most positive characteristics, setting aside everything about him or her that doesn’t fit that glowing remembrance. Writer-director Ryan Coogler’s Fruitvale Station aims for something far more difficult: mourning an ordinary, clearly flawed man without denying his inherent failings. This more nuanced portrait does nothing to diminish the shame of his death—if anything, it only intensifies its sting.
A prizewinner at Sundance and Cannes, Fruitvale Station is inspired by the last day of 22-year-old Oscar Grant’s life. Very early on New Year’s Day 2009, the Bay Area resident was returning with some buddies and his girlfriend to Oakland from San Francisco on the BART when an altercation on the train resulted in cops detaining Oscar and killing him. But Coogler’s feature debut only delves into those events at the very end—the bulk of the film is about the life Oscar was leading before his death.
Played by Michael B. Jordan (The Wire, Chronicle), Oscar comes across as a nice-enough guy at first. Up early on New Year’s Eve, he spends time with his girlfriend, Sophina (Melonie Diaz), and their four-year-old daughter, Tatiana (Ariana Neal), before getting preparations together for a birthday party that evening for his mother, Wanda (Octavia Spencer). But almost from the beginning, this seemingly idyllic scene is muddied: Sophina strongly suspects that Oscar is still screwing around with a local girl, an accusation he can’t quite convince her isn’t true.
For much of Fruitvale Station’s short running time—it’s less than 85 minutes long—Coogler and Jordan continue with this warts-and-all depiction of Oscar. Charming and goodhearted as Oscar may be, the guy has a fearsome temper, spent time in jail, sold drugs, and been unable to hold down a regular job because he’s lazy and directionless. On occasion, Coogler can oversell Oscar’s sweet nature—never more overtly than when Oscar befriends a stray dog, a clear symbol of his own untamed behavior. But for the most part, Fruitvale Station spends less time canonizing this kid than it does genuinely worrying about him. Oscar is a decent, likable person, and if he lived somewhere that offered more economic opportunity, he’d probably go far. But he resides in a poor section of the Bay Area far away from Silicon Valley and San Francisco, and so he turned to drug dealing, which a few years earlier landed him in the slammer and could possibly determine his destiny.