Review of Precious: Based on the Novel 'Push' by Sapphire (2009) by Ypomoni — 04 Jul 2013
When you read about the theme of this film, an obese teenage girl, illiterate, constantly abused physically and emotionally by her mother, and pregnant with her second child after being raped (again) by her father, you think "heavy melodrama". This film is by no means "light" but it's far from being a melodrama. This story feels "real", even for us who have never experienced what Precious calls everyday life, and this is partially to do with the excellent casting.
Everyone in this film does a marvellous job, but the person that really excelled, in my opinion, was Mo'Nique; she plays a horrible creature which you have just gotta hate, and she nailed the role of the abusive, angry, lazy and jealous mother, right down to the part where she admits everything she did was because she wanted to be loved. No, you don't get to feel sorry for her, that's the brilliance of this performance. What you do realise is that this terrible transformation can happen to anyone, and that's the scary part.
The only reason I didn't give this film a higher score was because I found it to bit a too slow-paced for my liking. As for the ending, it was surprisingly uplifting and left you with a sense of optimism.
This review of Precious: Based on the Novel 'Push' by Sapphire (2009) was written by Ypomoni on 04 Jul 2013.
Precious: Based on the Novel 'Push' by Sapphire has generally received positive reviews.
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