“‘All of the above’ is not an answer.” Such is the love advice issued by the monogamously married, but restless Alan (Roy Wood Jr.) to his best friend, Roger (Andre Holland), the central character in “Love, Brooklyn,” directed by Rachael Abigail Holder and written by Paul Zimmerman. Alan’s words come as a gentle scolding to Roger, a writer living in Bedford-Stuyvesant who is a part of a situationship triangle with two women. Like a diner reviewing a menu, Roger can’t (or won’t) settle on a main course, and this brain fog extends to his work: He’s on a publishing deadline and can’t move beyond his writer’s block long enough to capture his mixed emotions about gentrified Brooklyn.
It’s not entirely clear if Roger is in love with his ex-girlfriend Casey (Nicole Beharie) and/or the booty-calling Nicole (DeWanda Wise), a recently widowed single mother, but he is at least hung up on them. And, though the film suggests that these two women are in transitional moments of their own and don’t know what they want long enough to give Roger clear signals, it soon becomes clear that Roger is as unsure as they are. They may be playing him, but homeboy is playing himself.
These three Black and Lovelies stroll through parks and museums and flash disarming smiles, but a lot of the flirtatious play that is supposed to pass as chemistry feels unconvincing. On the other hand, in a cinematic world that traffics casually in formulaic heterosexual relationships, it’s refreshing to see over-thirty-five-year-olds blurring the lines of intimacy and friendship without inevitably working up a head of steam toward marriage. Alan and his wife are the obligatory married couple tossed into the story as a point of contrast, but ultimately, Roger, Casey, and Nicole are, despite their profound loneliness, quite settled in their single status. Owing more to the strong performances of Beharie and Wise than the writing, we find a sufficient amount of emotional nuance between them, but only Nicole is provided a backstory that explains why she is so commitment-averse.
To say the streets of Brooklyn are a singular character in the film, or that the central love affair in the movie is between the filmmaker and the borough, names the obvious. Anyone who knows central Brooklyn will find themselves playing “name that landmark” as the camera wistfully follows Roger on his bike down the streets of the neighborhoods surrounding Bed-Stuy. This purposeful and selective scan of brownstone architecture, as well as scenes of comfortable cafes and tastefully furnished interiors, represents a tunnel vision that serves to affirm all that is so charming about brownstone Brooklyn. Holder’s loving and tender varnish on buppie life is reminiscent of neo-soul romantic comedies like “Strictly Business,” “Boomerang,” and “Love Jones” that were produced in the nineties to provide a counter-narrative to the white romance and material success dominating the big screen at the time.
“Love, Brooklyn” is not only a cultural throwback, but the way it references gentrification in historically Black Brooklyn feels a bit late to the conversation. It’s so… 2015. Like most treatments of generational displacement and neighborhood change you find in popular culture, Roger has only the most superficial of insights to offer, while being oblivious to how he is a driver and agent of the “new” Brooklyn himself.
“Love, Brooklyn” is on a limited run in theaters, but audiences were treated to free screenings in the park in Brooklyn this summer as well. This is where this earnest and reverential film can be best appreciated, sitting shoulder-to-shoulder with your long-term and recently arrived neighbors alike, in Brower, Von King, Fort Greene, or Lincoln Terrace Parks, surrounded by the beauty and contradictions of this hollowed ground.