In the middle of a summer of dumb fun and comic-book escapism, it’s some kind of miracle to find a film as seriously ambitious, scrappy and suspenseful as Luce. A provocation about race, privilege and ...

Regardless of the premise behind the age-old foundation we still call the American Dream, not all are afforded the same prosperous outcome. Only the most powerful are granted the benefit of the doubt ...

It is a given that expectations can be a double-edged sword. Yet what can be ambiguous is how those expectations are wielded. When someone is stereotyped to fail the menace is self-evident, but what ...

Luce begins with a provocation. The film’s plot is set into motion by an essay that Luce Edgar (played by Kelvin Harrison Jr.), a star student at a suburban high school, turns in to one of his ...

Rising star Kelvin Harrison Jr. plays an African youth adopted by white parents who comes under suspicion in gifted director Julius Onah's tough look at prejudice. When people say a movie feels like a ...

To say that this feature unfolds like a play is both accurate and undersells just how gorgeously it has been rendered for the screen. By Ben Kenigsberg When you purchase a ticket for an independently ...

A cruel story of youth, race and the politics of respectability, “Luce” grows out of a conflict between a high school history teacher, Harriet Wilson (Octavia Spencer), and one of her star pupils, ...

We never learn the true name of the title character in director Julius Onah’s adaptation of J.C. Lee’s Off-Broadway play. When his parents adopted him from Eritrea when he was a child, he tells an ...

Based on a play by JC Lee, Luce, Julius Onah’s third film as director, feels like one of split focus. On one hand it wants to say something about racial prejudice and conformity to the standards of a ...

We meet soon-to-be-class-valedictorian Luce (Kelvin Harrison Jr.) as he's addressing a high school assembly in Northern Virginia, saying all the right things about a rosy future. He is clearly ...

Naomi Watts and Tim Roth worry about their adopted son Kelvin Harrison Jr. in Julius Onah's drama 'Luce.' By THR Staff An ambitious drama that can’t be content with its promising central conflict, ...