Held me so fast I was outbid on eBay: Clemency reviewed

Clemency stars Alfre Woodard as a prison warden on death row whose job is beginning to take its toll, and if you think it sounds like a tough watch, you’d be right. But it is also a masterwork, won the Grand Jury prize at Sundance, and doesn’t at any juncture call on the uplifting, healing power of cake — see: Love Sarah — so it has that going for it too.

It’s yet another film that you’ll have to stream digitally. (July was meant to be the month new films began opening in cinemas but at the moment it feels as though we’re waiting to see which of the major film companies will blink first and take the risk.) However, all this watching from home does allow for a new rating system. Forget awarding stars; it’s how often you sigh, hit ‘pause’, then open another tab to bid for some tat on eBay or check out a recipe you’ll probably never make. (I have never not made so many recipes as during lockdown.) In this way, a 90-minute film can take several hours. But Clemency not only held me fast — it’s a zero-pause film — I was even outbid on a vintage sideboard I’d had my eye on for ages, goddammit.

The film is written and directed by Chinonye Chukwu, a Nigerian-American and the first black woman to win the Grand Jury prize. It opens with our protagonist, Bernadine (Woodard), preparing for an execution. (I think ‘prison warden’ would translate as ‘prison governor’ over here.) She is meticulously professional and ordered and calm and unreadable. As we’ll see later, she is the one who has to explain matter-of-factly to a condemned man how it’ll work — ‘the last drug is potassium chloride, which will cease your heart function’ — and ask questions such as: ‘Do you have any family members who would like to claim your body?’ It’s not the job for everyone.