Percival Everett's "Erasure" came out in 2001 as a response to the commercialization of rap culture and the ensuing in da ghetto stereotypes. This much belated adaptation, which would have been perfectly timed ten years ago, does a good job in bringing the main points across, but the novel is far more enjoyable and uncompromising.

I understand why the death of the protagonist's sister has been watered down, that part was the most difficult to accept in the original text. But the book he writes as a response is printed in full there, and I don't get why this was just briefly alluded to with a completely different characterization. In the real "My Pafology", the protagonist is a youngster with four kids by four mothers whom he abuses and cheats, and his downfall is copied from Richard Wright's "Native Son" replacing murder with rape. That is way more revealing as to the perverse satisfaction white Americans derive from confirming their stereotypes of the good-for-nothing black male, a service they compensate with recognition and money.

The film rushes through the talking points without giving due credit to its own title, the work of fiction it's based on. There is one nice add-on, a dialogue between the protagonist and the author of the stereotypical book that initially draws his ire, but overall those who have read "Erasure" will likely feel disappointed, while those who only watch the film will not know how much they've been missing.

The movie American Fiction starts off with a bang of a scene that makes you think, "Oh. This is going to be amazing." From beginning to end, there are a number of sharp, brilliant, stingingly funny scenes. But they're interspersed between what feels like another movie - a bittersweet yet heartwarming family drama. Two movies with the same characters running along a parallel story arc that occasionally intersect. On more than one occasion I found myself asking, wait, which movie am I watching?

First, there is the movie as described in the IMDB synopsis: "Jeffrey Wright stars as Monk, a frustrated novelist who's fed up with the establishment profiting from "Black" entertainment that relies on tired and offensive tropes. To prove his point, Monk uses a pen name to write his own outlandish "Black" book--that propels him into the heart of hypocrisy and the madness he claims to disdain."

This movie is awesome. But it only shows up on occasion as what sometimes feels like a sub-plot of the other movie.

The other movie also stars Jeffrey Wright as Monk, same frustrated, emotionally disconnected, lost character. He takes a highly-encouraged leave of absence from his university teaching job and goes and reconnects with his emotionally damaged and broken yet still loving family. The great cast includes Tracee Ellis Ross as his accomplished, primary-bearer-of-responsibility sister; Sterling K. Brown as his middle-aged, recently-heterosexually-divorced, now out-gay-and-on-the-prowl brother; and, best of all, the legendary Leslie Uggams as his rapidly-on-the-decline-but-won't-acknowledge-it mother. Monk gradually, reluctantly takes more and more responsibility to care for his mother and be an active brother, accomplishing some middle age growing up in the process. It's a very nice, warm, if not particularly inspiring movie. It serves as the narrative background for the first movie.

The first movie is also a kind of journey of maturity, responsibility and self-discovery, along with being a biting and very funny satire. It's way more interesting and fun. Unfortunately, we don't get to spend a lot of time there. It's too bad, because each time it reappeared I thought, now THIS is the movie that I want to see. The effect is a feeling of story-drive interruptus. The first movie brings a level of building tension that wets your appetite with anticipation (OMG, what's going to happen next? I can't look but want to look!). And then it drops that tension and momentum when we move back to what is actually the main story line with him and his family. I kept feeling like, no wait, don't go back to the family movie, stay with this one!

The good thing is that it comes back around to the first movie at the end with a climax scene that is sharp, cynical and hilarious.

One thing that impressed me with the movie was how natural all the actors sounded during most of its run, almost as if the trials and tribulations of the principals were actually happening and being committed to film. So, kudos to Cord Jefferson for achieving that in his directorial debut. Except for Leslie Uggams in the cast, I haven't seen any of the other principals, and all did a fine job. Uggams by the way, looked fantastic in the story approaching the age of eighty in real life. I want to know what magic elixir she's drinking. The story gets more and more absurd when college professor Thelonius 'Monk' Ellison (Jeffrey Wright) becomes increasingly frustrated with the lack of appreciation for his works of literature while being relegated to the African-American section of his local library. While marveling at the attention received by writer Sintara Golden (Issa Rae) for penning a novel about life in the hood, Monk decides to put his disdain of popular culture to the test by writing a novel in the same vein as a lark. When it becomes a hit and optioned for a movie treatment, he calls into question the entire insanity of modern culture for what he considers junk. Fortunately, when it came to the circumstances of his life and the precarious situation of his mother (Uggams) and her encroaching Alzheimer's, Monk decided not to pull the plug on his good fortune, but follow it through, even when complicated by his having been chosen to judge new releases for a literary award, one of which turned out to be his. I wasn't quite satisfied with the mock ending of the proposed movie about Monk's experience, the one in which he's mistakenly shot at the awards ceremony. I would have preferred one in which the audience was forced to deal with the revelation that Monk used the name of Stagg R. Leigh to write 'My Pafology', which he later renamed "F...". Personally, I think 'F... It' had a better ring to it.

For those without historical perspective, the real Stagger Lee was Lee Shelton, an African-American pimp living in St. Louis, Missouri, in the late 19th century. He was nicknamed Stag Lee or Stack Lee, with a variety of explanations being given for his nickname. I'll let the reader investigate further if interested. 'Stagger Lee' became a popular song released by Lloyd Price in 1958, rising to the top of the R&B and pop charts in 1959. It was inspired by an actual murder that took place late on the evening of December 25, 1895, in a St. Louis bar.