A young street magician named Bo is left to care for his little sister after their parents' death and turns to illegal activities to keep a roof over their heads. By day Bo performs magic tricks all over Los Angeles, with his specialty as being able to control anything metal, even float it in the air. He does this by building an electromagnet into his arm, with the negative electrode of the battery running to his thumb and the positive electrode running to his fingers. He first developed the electromagnet in high school for a science project, which earned him an engineering scholarship but he had to turn it down in order to take care of his sister after his mom died. By night he sells drugs to pay the bills, seeing it as steady work with his supplier Angelo usually being a nice guy. However, things get ugly when a new kingpin comes in and starts selling drugs for cheaper on their turf. Angelo has Bo find this kingpin, so Bo uses his pickpocketing skills as a magician when he goes to a club, managed by one of Bo's friends, where the new kingpin has his dealers selling. Bo asks one of the dealers for drugs and pickpockets his phone to look up his call history, and finds out that his supplier's name is Maurice. Angelo finds where Maurice lives, invades his house with Bo and forces Bo to chop off his hand. Bo then gets in too deep when he tries to skim $15,000 off the money he makes from drug dealing so he and his sister can leave town. When Angelo finds out, he threatens to kill Bo unless he can come up with $45,000 in one week. Bo finds the money, but has to steal the last $9,000 from his friend the club owner by watching her unlock the safe when she invites him up to the main office; he pickpockets the office keys as they leave. He waits to have one last drink with his friend, feeling guilty for having stolen from her, yet relieved he may make it out of his predicament alive. However, Maurice's gang is at the club at the same time. When they spot him, they knock him out, handcuff him and put him in the trunk of a car. Bo manages to escape by using his electromagnet to lift the latches on the handcuffs and trunk, but Maurice stole all his money. When his sister is kidnapped by Angelo as ransom, he is forced to get back in touch with his old high school science teacher to get more power to his electromagnet. The teacher has an idea to add a feedback oscillator, but warns that it may cause the wires in his arm to overheat. Bo then goes to Angelo's house with the supplemented electromagnet to find out where his sister is, where he rips out one of his ex-co-worker's gold teeth, hits the other with his own aluminum bat and then sends it flying into the wall. When Angelo goes to shoot him, he stops the bullets and causes the lights to flicker. He then drops the bullets to the floor, picks one up and slowly burrows it into Angelo's forehead to force him to divulge Bo's sister's whereabouts. After Angelo tells Bo that his sister is with his aunt, he releases the bullet from Angelo and gives him $15,000 before leaving. Bo goes to pick her up with his arm burnt and they start a new life with Bo's girlfriend Holly in San Diego. As they are getting accustomed to their life, Bo still does street magic as his arm has now healed and Holly walks in on him in the bathroom late at night developing a new trick after waking up to all the lights in the house flickering.
Cast
Jacob Latimore as Bashir "Bo" Wolfe
Seychelle Gabriel as Holly
Dulé Hill as Angelo
Storm Reid as Tina Wolfe
Sasheer Zamata as Georgi
Michael Villar as Packy
Brandon Johnson as Ramone
Cameron Esposito as Luna
Release
The film premiered at the 2016 Sundance Film Festival on January 23, 2016. On January 28, 2016, WWE Studios and BH Tilt acquired distribution rights to the film. The film was released on April 28, 2017, by WWE Studios and BH Tilt.
Box office
In North America, Sleight was released alongside How to Be a Latin Lover, and The Circle, and was projected to gross $1–2 million from 565 theaters in its opening weekend. It ended up debuting to $1.7 million, finishing 14th at the box office.
Critical response
On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 77% based on 38 reviews, and an average rating of 5.9/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "Sleight subverts genre norms, delivering a smart and well-acted – if ultimately somewhat frustrating – magical mystery." On Metacritic, the film has a score 62 out of 100, based on reviews from 18 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".
