I’ve talked about this one way or another before, but I thought it particularly apt in the wake of a few movies that have sparked some interesting chats in recent days.

Oh, and this whole thing is full of Spoilers! So beware.

Although only one is based on a true story, both “The Blind Side” and “Avatar,” Academy-Award Winners now, have troubling racial narratives. Everyone on earth has seen one or both of these movies, but the quick rundown is as follows: “The Blind Side” is a fictionalized story about a white family (specifically a rich white Christian lady and her family) that takes in a massive black man who is literally shivering on the street in front of their house one night, and makes sure he learns real good how to be a gentleman so he can succeed at what you must succeed at if you’re a massive black man: sports, and in this case football. And then he goes to the NFL. And housewives in Middle America cry. Heh. (I finally downloaded this movie the other night. Bullock is fine. Not Oscar great, but, hey, whatever. But the plot is vomitorious.)

And “Avatar” is the old Noble Savage trope: White man joins native tribe, falls for native princess, supposed to take tribe down, realizes they are totes awesome, assumes leadership role of the tribe because he is teh awesome. It’s really never explained why he’s talented enough to capture the dragon-beast, except that he has a “good heart” (even though he is “like a baby”). And then he takes down white people instead, with the help of white peoples’ weapons and some mutant triceratops and the like. People all around the world fellate James Cameron. (And I still did enjoy the movie*.)

*Call me foolish, but I do believe it’s possible to enjoy a movie as a silly spectacle and still view it with a critical eye. So that’s more or less how I think of “Avatar.” It was fun, and I really did enjoy the experience in the theater, but as soon as I have to watch it in 2D on a regular screen I’m sure I’ll just be overwhelmed by the noble savagery. So, I think I’m gonna not ever do that.

Anyway, and there’s also “Precious: Based on the really this is all part of the title? Okay.” Now, I really did like this movie, and was rooting for Gabby Sidibe to win. (By the way, why was everyone treating her like she was severely mentally challenged? She’s an actress who played an illiterate teenager. It was a performance, and a great one. She is not, in fact, “Precious.” Jeez.) Some corners of the internet have complained that it shows black people in an unfairly negative light, and that there is colorism (for those of you who don’t know: showing light-skinned blacks in a more positive light than dark-skinned ones, or vice-versa) all over the film. I tend to disagree with the former point (the latter might be fairly true, aside from Precious herself), in that there really are some black people suffering through fucked up situations. I’m not sure how many of them were raped by their father twice and had a TV thrown at them by their mother while running away with a baby (yes, this happens), but dramatic license, I guess. And at the end of the movie, there’s a sliver of happiness, and I think showing that Precious is able to find some measure of success, even after living through what she had to endure, is ultimately a positive portrayal of our race.

But movies like “Precious” (Are there really any? It’s a pretty singular film experience) are not like the vast majority of movies that deal with racial issues. You end up, usually, with the noble savage stuff (See, also, or don’t: “The Last Samurai”), or the magical negro (See: “The Green Mile,” “The Legend of Bagger Vance”), or just straight up self-imposed buffoonery (“Soul Plane,” “Who’s Your Caddy?” “All About The Benjamins,” and you don’t even remember this bullshit, do you?). You’ve also got Tyler Perry’s divisive stuff that some people like, but I will never get into, because he doesn’t know how not to veer wildly from melodrama to himself in drag.

What I would like to see, maybe, is some movie where there are positive and negative black characters, that isn’t JUST about the fact that they’re black. They managed to make a few of these movies in the early part of the last decade (“The Best Man,” “Love and Basketball,”) where race existed but wasn’t the focus of it, but those movies didn’t make any money (how many of you who aren’t black have seen them? Be honest!), so they seem to have given up.

But part of me realizes that maybe these movies aren’t realistic. Any black professional may have a happy and well-adjusted life, but the fact that they are a successful BLACK professional is going to be tossed in their face every day, for better or worse.

Or maybe I want black characters to interact with characters of other races on equal footing, not necessarily learning from whites or performing magical deeds for them, but merely existing as a part of their lives.

So, as is often the case, I do not have a solution to the issues raised here. Maybe I should write the movies myself. I think “Precious” gaining such exposure, even for a depressing story, is important, and that we need to support different stories about race and avoid the same damn narrative tropes. We – black people, Hollywood, America, whomever – can make better choices, and create better movies.

Because even though a fair amount of people do know about “Precious” in all the big cities where it was released, most of the country (and the world) isn’t going to see that movie, and we’re left with movies like the other two, which, in the racial department, are not quite right.

But hey. At least no white person stopped a black Oscar winner from giving his spee… oh wait.

Heh.

Peace and love,
Justin PBG