I haven't read Walter Mosley's 2004 novel The Man in My Basement, but based on director Nadia Latif's screen adaptation, I suspect it may be one of those notoriously unfilmable works. This movie attempts to contend with heady themes that are probably best explored in the written word, and Latif's film seems to have bitten off more than it can chew. There are two key subplots here. One might make for an engrossing two-hander stage production while the other could be an intriguing movie in its own right, but here they clash in a way that makes both of these storylines distract from one another.
The main plot follows the sort of narrative that might have superficially fuelled a '90s thriller, and indeed the film is set in that very decade. Thirtysomething African-American Charles Blakey (Corey Hawkins) has been struggling to make ends meet since losing his job at the local bank, which is now threatening to foreclose the family home he inherited. When a strange white businessman, Anniston Bennet (Willem Dafoe), shows up on his doorstep looking to rent his basement, Charles initially turns him away. After several futile attempts to raise money, Charles decides to accept Anniston's offer, and is shocked to discover this strange white man is willing to pay $65,000 for two months' use of the basement.
Of course, there's a catch. When Charles brings Anniston coffee the following morning he finds he has erected a DIY prison cell in the middle of his basement. Thinking of the optics of a white man being imprisoned in his basement, Charles orders Anniston to leave, but Anniston doubles his offer. Anniston claims that he wishes to use his solitude to embark on a "spiritual journey" of "reading, writing and thinking," and his demands are that he be left alone, visited by Charles only to bring him his meals (the toiletry arrangements are left unmentioned).
The irony of a white man imprisoning himself yet still expecting a black man to act as his servant is the starting point for a muddled treatise on race, class and power dynamics. Anniston gets inside his host's head, but we don't see enough of their interactions for this idea to land with any real impact. The movie is most engaging when Hawkins and Dafoe are intellectually sparring on opposite sides of the prison bars, trading conflicting ideas on morality. Anniston seems privy to details of Charles' troubled psyche, which leads to a late reveal that is played as a shock but which the audience will have figured out ahead of time.
The two lead actors are excellent, and with less compelling performers the whole conceit would quickly collapse. The role of Charles was initially set to be played by Jonathan Majors, and Hawkins plays the part with a similar mix of volatility and insecurity that we just saw Majors deploy in Magazine Dreams. Dafoe uses his uniquely sinister charm to good effect, and despite Anniston's imprisonment, we're never in any doubt as to who has the upper hand here. But we're left to wish the movie had opted to play out its drama entirely in the basement and allow these two actors time to fully dig into their characters, as theatrical as that might be.
The secondary subplot sees Charles discover several West African tribal masks in his home, which he presents to antiques dealer Narciss (Anna Diop) for a valuation. When Narciss declares the masks priceless, it's not the answer Charles was hoping for. Where Charles sees their value purely in monetary terms, for Narciss they represent a valuable reminder of their people's past. This conflict could fuel a movie of its own, but it's never given the time it truly deserves here. It's also difficult to buy into the burgeoning romantic relationship that develops between Charles and Narciss, as the former behaves in such a creepy manner in her presence.
Despite Mosley contributing as co-writer, you can't help but feel that much has been lost in translation in this book to screen adaptation. Given its very American theme, it's hard not to wonder if an African-American director might have fared better with this material than the Sudanese-British Latif. Coming from a background in British theatre, it's perhaps no surprise that Latif's film is most effective when she's simply filming two actors in a verbal bout. The movie's nightmare sequences and jump scares are out of place and come off as a cynical attempt to market the film to a horror audience. The horrors implied in The Man in My Basement are of the very human variety, but the film never really confronts them in a narratively satisfying manner.
Directed by: Nadia Latif
Starring: Corey Hawkins, Willem Dafoe, Anna Diop, Tamara Lawrance
