Fall festival season is just around the corner, which means you’ll be hearing a lot about the Oscar races and big acquisitions and potentially some big-ass flops from prestige studios in the film press over the next few weeks or so. But you’ll also be seeing a lot of the films making their debuts — it’ll be a goddamn trailer deluge, practically — and Tuesday saw the release of a pretty big one. A24 dropped the first look at Elegance Bratton’s The Inspection, which is a semi-autobiographical film about Bratton’s experiences as a gay and Black man who joins the Marine Corps and finds expected pain (basic training, homophobia and racism) and unexpected joy (the friends he makes, the community he becomes a part of). We’re gonna go ahead and recommend you grab some tissues because this one’s probably gonna make you cry, and we can also suggest some good eye drops so nobody asks you what’s the matter in the Target check-out line later on in the day.
Take a look:
Here’s a synopsis:
“In Elegance Bratton’s deeply moving film inspired by his own story, a young, gay Black man, rejected by his mother and with few options for his future, decides to join the Marines, doing whatever it takes to succeed in a system that would cast him aside. But even as he battles deep-seated prejudice and the grueling routines of basic training, he finds unexpected camaraderie, strength, and support in this new community, giving him a hard-earned sense of belonging that will shape his identity and forever change his life.”
The Inspection will have its world premiere at TIFF in a few weeks, but A24 seems pretty bullish on its prospects: They’ve already announced that it’ll hit theaters on November 18. And based on what we’ve seen here, it seems like a decent play.