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 How
many tragic events can happen to two characters in order to bring
them together before you have to ask, could this actually be possible?
Sometimes, a screenplay is just too heavy-handed, and the story in
Monster’s Ball is one of those times. This second film
by director Marc Forster features Halle Berry
as poor black mother Leticia Musgrove and Billy Bob Thornton
as second-generation corrections officer Hank Grotowski. Hank is in
charge of the Death Row officers about to execute Lawrence (Sean
Combs), who, unbeknownst to Hank, is Leticia’s husband.
This is just one of a series of coincidences that ultimately connect
Hank and Leticia. Add into the mix that Hank is a racist living with
his even-more-racist father (Peter Boyle) and his
not-so-racist corrections officer son (Heath Ledger),
and you’ve got a volatile situation about to explode.
Monster’s Ball has a gritty, artsy feel to it, with
the camera stopping often to linger on a character staring dejectedly
into space or carrying out some self-destructive life routine. It
is an actors’ showcase, and Berry benefited with her Oscar
win. But ultimately, there is not enough depth to the story to make
us care about the characters’ struggle for redemption. Even
the film’s centerpiece graphic sex scene between Hank and
Leticia seems more inevitable than transformative. In the end, none
of the characters” monsters seem fully tamed, nor do we particularly
care.
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