by Samuel Nichols, Contributing Writer
This is the beginning of a beautiful hot streak, my friends. Devotion is the first of three movies that sensation Jonathan Majors will appear in over the next couple of months. In February, he will reprise his role as Kang the Conquerer in Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, and in March, he will act as the foil in Creed III. After that, he will appear as Kang again 2025 and 2026 in two consecutive Avengers entries. And somewhere between those, he will portray Dennis Rodman in a story about the NBA Hall of Famer’s crazy trip to Las Vegas during the 1998 NBA season. We are about to see a lot more of Mr. Majors, and in some very high-profile roles. But here, at the end of 2022, as awards season is blooming, he gives a touching performance as real-life hero Ensign Jesse Brown in Devotion,which will likely be overshadowed by the big-ticket releases all around it. But that shadow won’t keep me from singing its praises.
Devotion follows Brown (Majors) during his time as a naval pilot in the late 1940s and early stages of the Korean War. As the first African-American who completed the Navy’s basic flight program, he had more pressure and scrutiny against him than any of his peers. A friendship developed between himself and Lieutenant Tom Hudner (Glen Powell). These two were fast friends during their service, before and during deployment. As the two enter the field of the Korean War, that bond is tested in ways that one cannot imagine. They face daunting enemies, and Hudner becomes exposed to discrimination against Brown. Through all of it, that friendship between them is the driving force in this movie about two men who came to become deeply devoted to each other.
As mentioned before, movies like this allow us to see the great range Majors has as an actor. Never fighting back but surging forward, his actions and restraint in the face of racism is inspiring. Majors captures that beautifully. Similarly, the personal moments we get between Brown and his wife Daisy (Christina Jackson) or Hudner let us get to know the man and experience the joys in his life. Someone with less range than Majors would have decreased the impact this movie would have.
On the supporting side, both Powell and Jackson are well cast in their roles. Powell plays a great friend to Powell without being the white savior. We get to see him learn about the difficulties Brown faces, and seeing him grow as a friend endears his character to us. Jackson has the sweet and loving nature one would imagine, but gets the opportunity to be more than that too. Her own endurance as a military wife is put on screen multiple times, and she handles the challenges that come with just the right amount of grace.
As this is a war movie, more than a few action sequences are put before us as an audience. All of them are well captured by the camera, but they increase in terms of quality as the story goes on. Most importantly, the battles in the Korean war show just how desperate the situation was for the American troops, and the sheer difficulty of the air missions. Using steady cam and cockpit shots of our pilots, the action and emotional stakes are kept high, and are used to bring us on the edge of our seats. In particular, during Brown and Hudner’s final mission, there is a marvelous long take of a pilot crashing his plane and emerging from it to walk to help a friend.
On the negative side, there are some subplots and side characters that seem a bit tangential that could have been cut from the story. These characters do play an important purpose in the movie, but when it is over two hours and 15 minutes long, one starts to look for things that could have been removed. There is a bit of a contrast between the first and second halves of the film, as the former is much more character-based; but it helps set the stage for the importance of everything in the latter.
Really not much here can be criticized. It is a strong story with an excellent performance from Majors at its center. I cannot wait to see his run continue to unfold in front of us.
Score: 8/10
Devotion is currently playing in theaters
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