Rashad Frett’s directorial debut is a brilliantly touching, masterfully constructed critique of the American penal system and its inability to create clear paths for success and rehabilitation to the people it incarcerates. It reminds us how the solutions we seek in life sometimes tend to exacerbate problems rather than relieve them. Through Frett’s lens, and by way of an exceptionally exuberant performance by lead actor Stephan James, the film tells a story that is all too common in modern society. It is a story of what happens when people are a brought into harms way by societal mechanisms that supposedly exist for their rehabilitation.
Having spent just as much of his life in jail as out, Ricardo is completely unequipped to return to the real world. Much like a soldier returning home from war, he struggles with social interactions and must learn to forget the language of violence he that was so prevalent in the prison system. His newfound freedom becomes a burden and struggles organizing a life that for the last 15 years had been so strictly regimented and structured for him. He must either learn to persevere in the face of struggle, or simply resolve himself into becoming just another statistic.
Bolstered by a strong supporting cast of actors such as Sheryl Lee Ralph (Abbot Elementary), Titus Welliver (The Town and Argo), and Andrene Ward-Hammond (61st Street and Your Honor), Ricky isn’t just a tale that laments the judicial system, and it’s systemic faults, it also is a testament to the better nature of humankind. It shows us that much as violence begets violence, doing good also encourages others to do good. Goodwill and grace can be just as infectious, and they are the pathways to real resolute change.
The story told here in Ricky isn’t new, in fact it’s been told many times before. But films like Ricky are the kind that need to be told over and over again. It’s a story that is a call to arms to every new generation that it is told to. It is a film that is necessary not just for the community and culture, but for the people as well. As long as inequality and injustice exist in the systems we design and put in place, then there will always be a film like Ricky to serve as a beacon of light and hope for the future.
