Blazy or Lazy: ‘Is God Is’ Trailer

BREAKDOWN

Story Hook: Oh, it’s immediate. Rich, earthy, soul-deep. Different.

Two young women are summoned by their spittin’-image, burned-up, bed-ridden mama. She spells them with a supernatural task: kill your father. Dead, dead.

Visual Impact: It’s the kind of color saturation you’d find in a Kehinde Wiley portrait, but frayed and muted by the hollowness of horror.

The images hit like a music video — blonde braids against brown skin, charred flesh, clasped, disfigured hands. It feels like an open vein of hell and healing.

The two women look as connected as the Wonder Twins and as unsettling as the ones from The Shining.

Performance Promises: Welcome back to one of the most dynamic actors of the ’90s, Ms. Vivica A. Fox. She drags these girls into a preternatural kaleidoscope with the same force as the cigarette she pulls on from the confines of her bed. She looks ready to turn this into a showcase of that classic Fox technique — confidence, attitude, command.

Pertinents: 

Directed by: Aleshea Harris
Screenplay by: Aleshea Harris
Based on: Harris’s award-winning play of the same name

Produced by: Tessa Thompson, Kishori Rajan, Riva Marker, Janicza Bravo, Aleshea Harris
Executive Producers: Stacy O’Neil, Nicole King, Kenneth Yu

Cast: Kara Young, Mallori Johnson, Janelle Monáe, Erika Alexander, Mykelti Williamson, Josiah Cross, with Vivica A. Fox and Sterling K. Brown

Verdict: This trailer turns whisper into sacred wine. Is God Is looks theatrical, mythic, and take-that, in-yo-face stylized, like a sermon remixed with a revenge verse. It spits. The imagery is loud, the tone is fearless, and Harris clearly knows the world she’s building. Ooh, if the film keeps this same lyrical fury and supernatural pulse, it could bury folklore and rise back up as legend.