Spinning into Butter

I'm Impressed
I had never heard of this story, nor did I know it was originally a play by Rebecca Gilman. I saw the DVD in the video store with Sarah Jessica Parker on the front cover.

The movie does keep a bit of a play atmosphere, and the topics are spot on. Prepare to be provoked and get buttons pushed. I thought it was a refreshingly blunt piece - better than "Crash" - in my opinion, and the story is engaging. None of that abstract hidden agenda stuff. It gets right to the point and drags the issue out into the open.

Basic plot: a hate crime is committed at a New England college which sends the school into media chaos and causes the Dean of Students (Sarah Jessica Parker) to have to deal with her own issues of race.

Sarah Jessica does a pretty decent job in this, and so does Mykelti Williamson. Their on screen chemistry is great.

This movie isn't perfect nor bad...
I watched this film simply because of my love and admiration for actor Victor Rasuk (How To Make it in America, Lords of Dogtown) who plays Patrick Chibas, the Nuyorican who has had enough of the biased misconceptions of his ethnicity. I think he held his own in this film. He has about ten minutes of total screen time, but it works. The rest of the film is...eh. I'm not going into detail as other reviewers have. This is just my two cents, without the play by play.

"Spinning" kind of reminds you of a Saturday afternoon movie on basic cable television, except: there's Carrie-motha******'-Bradshaw yapping your face. It's kind of hilarious, really. She didn't strike me as a teacher (or educator of any kind) before viewing this, but in fact, it works for her as well. She plays the sympathetic, mousy Dean of Students, riddled with white-guilt in today's conservative society.

Not only does the film strike a nerve with me (I'm a black male), but it speaks the volume...

Doesn't quite work
Not only does the plot and motive make no sense, but many of the actors overemote as if they were still on a stage. The rest of it is just plain preachy and annoying.

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