Directing: B+
Acting: A-
Writing: B+
Cinematography: B
Editing: B+

In a surprising way, The Inspection justifies not just the existence of the U.S. Military, but the way it treats its recruits. Without ever saying these exact words, writer-director Elegance Bratton seems to be telegraphing that the US Marines teaches discipline, cultivates strength, and builds character—all the typical platitudes that at best I have mixed feelings about.

Billed as “inspired by true events,” those events were lived by Bratton himself, having joined the Marines after a decade of being homeless, that period following his mother kicking him out of their home for being gay. Jeremy Pope, here in his first starring role after all of two other feature film roles to date (he also had roles in the TV series Hollywood and Pose, and is a multiple-Tony-nominated Broadway actor), plays the fictionalized lead by the name of Ellis French. This is a fantastic acting choice, not just because he’s an out Gay Black man himself, but because of his subtle recognizability as one, without ever quite being coded as such onscreen. Pope can switch from uncomfortably insecure to steely resolve with aplomb.

I suppose you could call this a “gay Black G.I. Jane,” although that would be an oversimplification. Still, The Inspection is about a deeply marginalized character proving himself within constraints of the U.S. military that are challenging at best and barbaric at worst. There is a scene in which Ellis is conducting a test of his ability to save a drowning man, the man in the water being his gleefully bullying training instructor (Bokeem Woodbine), who literally drowns him. Only the subversive empathy of fellow instructor Rosales (Raúl Castillo) ultimately saves him.

So this is both the strength and the challenge of The Inspection, in that in one scene to the next, you have no idea how Ellis will be treated, and the uncertainty is what characterizes Ellis, to a degree at least, as an abused child. By the time Ellis is actually making a pass at Rosales (a moment scene in the film’s trailer), you are horrified for him.

Presumably these sorts of things actually happened in Elegance Bratton’s experience, or else why would he put them in the script? Still, this was behavior I truly could not understand: a gay man trying to keep under the radar in boot camp, still fantasizing about his fellow recruits while showering with them? I feel certain I would be so terrified of any such thing that I’d be rendered literally impotent in that scenario, but then, what do I know? I have never even showered communally with straight men, much less been in the military.

That said, the narrative trajectory of The Recruit is satisfying in its relative unpredictability. In past movies of this sort, Ellis’s sexuality would be a much more potent plot point, something kept hidden until a climactic reveal of some kind. Here, his sexuality becomes clear early on, and although it remains a central conflict in the story—being a major part of his endurance of harassment from all sides—it never becomes a movie about shame. Ellis knows who he is; he just feels like this is his only option for any kind of future.

Granted, there is a key conflict regarding Ellis’s sexuality, and that has to do with his mother’s rejection of him, and her burning resentment after he returns to her apartment asking for his birth certificate. Ellis’s mother is played by Gabrielle Union, who is great in all of about three notable scenes. I wonder if securing her as a name actor helped get the film financed, because otherwise Union’s ample talents are greater than what this role allows her to do.

Bratton dedicates this film to his mother, who reportedly passed away shortly before its release. Clearly The Inspection exists more as an exercise for Bratton to process his relationship with his mother, than as a straightforward story about a gay Black man in boot camp. Whatever the motivations, the movie works, and I was moved by it, even as I failed to see the necessity of not only the treatment of this one recruit, but all of them.

*Jeremy Pope shines as a great actor with vast potential.*

Overall: B+