Director: Tyler Perry

Story By: Tyler Perry

Cast: Joshua Boone, Amirah Vann, Austin Scott, Solea Pfieffer, Milauna Jackson, and Ryan Eggold

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You know… It wasn’t “bad” for Tyler Perry, and it felt slightly different for him creatively. 

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Theme & Story: A

Pacing: A-

Character: A-

Overall “Paper” Score: A-

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Entertainment Factors

General Public: Interesting Enough

Film Enthusiasts: Don’t Watch

Tyler Perry / Romance Drama Fans: Worth the Watch

Overall “Viewing Experience” Score: Don’t Rush

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TAKEAWAYS:

1. A brother falls in love with a “socially tarnished” girl whose life situation and features force her into an opportunity that complicates and jeopardizes their romantic relationship. This is A Jazzman’s Blues. 

Thematically, I followed a film that does a a good job at telling a story about the dangers that can come about when led solely by adrenaline infused love and passion/determination. 👍🏾

The story is pretty straightforward to me, which allows for it to be quite strong throughout. Personally, though, I found the second half of Act Two and all of Act Three to be the tightest in terms of theme and story cohesion. The acting also felt much stronger in Act Three. 👍🏾

2. UGH, Joshua Boone is such a handsome man! 😩😍

3. Chile, I can’t take the old woman make-up… 🤦🏾‍♂️

4. Was it just me, or did it seem like the time periods were all over the place at one point? The continuity of the settings felt odd for some reason. 🤔

5. This film is about 117 minutes long, and you definitely feel it. At one point I found myself saying “this is a long ass love story” and it really all comes down to the writing. There wasn’t enough engaging and meaningful dialogue and activity happening around the story. Instead, as a viewer, I had to wait for characters to interact specifically in order for the film to have some movement at the bare minimum. 🥴🤦🏾‍♂️

6. You want to know the best moment of Austin Scott for me? The moment Boone’s character had to go get him ready to head back to Georgia, and he was expressing his feelings while high. Something about that moment for him was solid. 👍🏾

7. Now who baby is that? 🤨🤦🏾‍♂️😂😂

8. SOOOO… Solea Pfeiffer couldn’t rock some botched old people make-up, too? 👀🤦🏾‍♂️

9. I’m on the fence about some of the interactions with the father. Sometimes it felt forced, and sometimes I recognized the importance for character development and plot movement… 🤷🏾‍♂️

10. Joshua Boone’s character was solidly written, and followed the theme well from beginning to end. His character definitely saved the direction of the story. 👍🏾

Austin Scott’s character was interesting. He definitely could’ve used a little more development to assist in his motivations, but he delivered a good performance as this contrasting character who embodied the determination aspect of the theme well. 👍🏾

Solea Pfeiffer didn’t have too much, but when it comes to carrying out the adrenaline-infused passion, her character was used in a good way. 👍🏾

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Overall #AJazzmansBlues gives Where the Crawdads Sing – meets Passing – meets Mufaro’s Beautiful Daughters – meets Hamlet – meets Sylvie’s Love – meets Temptation – meets Cinderfella

Within the first 5 minutes, I did have to adjust my viewing eye to one watching a young love story, which allowed me to appreciate the somewhat whimsical, cutesy vibe of Act One and every scene with the 2 main characters together. 

Because of how straightforward and clear this film was in this particular genre for Perry, his writing definitely stood out as having an impact on pacing for me. There really wasn’t any life and movement to how the film moved in the beginning, and instead felt like playing those adventure Nintendo games of the 90s where you walk in a shoppe, and have to click a character, read the dialogue, press “X” to read through the exchange in order to move forward (LOL). The writing is just too obviously planned out, restrained and “needed” vs feeling blended, authentic, and purposely loose if that makes sense. 

SN: 1. I think there could be a bright future for Joshua Boone. I liked him. I also liked Milauna Jackson. 

2. Perry needs to unpack his relationship with women because this isn’t the first time where he’s used a woman as the subtle villain in a man’s life who later has to sit with the blame… that Black church Adam and Eve is possibly a core foundation of his stories.