Precious Review: Too Powerful for Tears

Thanks to an array of outstanding performances, Precious is one of the year's most powerful films

Precious: Based on the Novel "Push" by Sapphire

Because the early screening of Precious came with a warning from the publicist to bring tissues, I fully expected to be a goner. Yet there I sat dry-eyed through all of Lee Daniels' screen adaptation of Sapphire's celebrated 1997 novel Push . The movie has the kind of authenticity and ugly immediacy that make the tears of a viewer sitting in the dark safety of a movie theater seem a little silly — indulgent even.

That's not to say there is a lack of compelling emotional material in the story of Claireece Precious Jones, an obese and pregnant teenager whose...

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