I believe Denzel Washington, who directed Fences, together with the the writer August Wilson - who is also the creator of the play - did not change one bit of the dialogue.
Hence, the movie played like a play, only that Washington put it under a camera and made a movie out of it. However, because it felt like a play and sounded like a play, it didn't play quite like a movie.
Even though Washington and Viola Davis gave exceptional performances, as did the rest of the cast; I thought watching this did not go as well as it could have been had more adaptation been put in to transform the play.
What I did not get, also, was how Davis was put in the Best Supporting Actress category when she clearly was the lead here. Her role was almost equal to that of Washington, just not in every frame of the movie.
But the rest of the cast - Stephen Henderson, Jovan Adepo, Russell Hornsby and Mykelti Williamson - all gave superb performances and could have easily been given a Best Supporting nomination, over Lucas Hedges whom I did not think deserved that nomination.
What Washington was able to do, though, with this movie was a beautiful progression diving into the characters of the two main leads. Plus with the top class performances, it never felt like the pacing was dragging along even though the running time was over two hours long and the whole thing was just dialogue after dialogue.
Still, it was quite heavy and I doubt I will be sitting through this one again anytime soon.
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