Addison Schacht (Ansel Elgort) is a high school senior in D.C. who recently lost his mother. His black friend Kevin gets murdered and everybody claims that he's in a gang. He decides to investigate on his own. His girlfriend Phoebe (Chloë Grace Moretz) is reluctant. His father (David Strathairn) is weak. Phoebe's mother (Catherine Keener) is a B. Principal Karlstadt (Terry Kinney) is evil. The police is too busy.

There is an issue with this movie. It's not set up well. It seems to be saying that Kevin is just another dead black kid to everyone without saying it out loud. It doesn't say anything about the school. They do slip in that it's a crime infested city and the school is probably in the rich suburbs. It needs to paint a more complete picture of the school before Principal Karlstadt makes more sense. It's just a lot non-setups. It has to explain why nobody wants to deal with Kevin's murder. Maybe everybody has accepted the status quo and Kevin is just another dead black kid. Maybe everybody thinks that Kevin is a drug dealing gangster. Maybe Kevin is a nobody and nobody cares about him. The movie doesn't really explain. Ansel Elgort brings his puppy dog eyes and his character seems to be naively obsessive for no good reason (unless the death of his mother is really the explanation). His explanation is non-sense. How much of a good friend is he to Kevin? It's not that clear. I'm not even sure about the time period. Non of it is set up. Addison does some really stupid things. If the character is going to be like this, he needs a much better setup. Instead of concentrating on the young couple's virginity, this movie needs to concentrate on Kevin and Addison.

Washington DC High School student Addison (Ansel Elgort) and friend Phoebe (Chloe Grace Moretz) drop into a coffee shop to see his buddy Kevin.

Later Addison discovers that Kevin has been killed in a gangland type execution. He tries to persuade the police that Kevin who was black was not involved in any type of gang activity but thy are not interested.

Addison takes it upon himself to investigate his friend's death. He discovers a world of drug dealing and that Kevin might had just innocuously upset someone.

There is a joke in this film as Addison takes his video camera with him to secretly film people and always get caught out with the red light showing.

Ansel Elgort who was memorable in Baby Driver desperately needs a second hit film. Frankly he looks too old to be high school student. The film is too generic and uninteresting. There is nothing smart about it. Some of the bad guys are one note and it just looks like a direct to video movie with a high calibre cast.

The acting game was on point. I also liked this kinda teen vibe the movie gives. But other than that, oh my god. The storyline was not just plain but even ridiculous. Explain this to me. We have this guy and in the beginning of the movie we get the impression that he's a mature intelligent kid with a good taste in music. But then after the homicide of one of his friends, he decides he should get involved with gang members so we could solve the murder. In the whole process it looks like he doesn't realize how hazardous the situation actually is. These gang leaders were constantly point out as this very dangerous guys a person shouldn't mess with. I mean, if it was in real life, they would probably kill him for knowing too much. But in the movie, he just thought he could go meet them and what, they will be like "Hi, sweetie, yeah, just a second, we will give you the name of the person who killed your friend, give us a moment, please"? So, yeah, the whole message the movie gave me was how naive some people can be. And how someone didn't make the effort to put more thought in the film.