Thank you, Mr. George, for taking the thoughts out of my head and articulating them.
I cannot describe my overall feelings towards the Civil Rights movies of today - so I began reading other writer's descriptions and thoughts about the movies, specifically The Help. Although I do consider myself a writer - I am not always able to express myself and emotions verbally or written - so I read. I read and learn and pray for an "Amen" moment or a "that's what I think" moment and I've found one. Although this writer has not completely encapsuled everything I want to say and everything that I want to articulate...I had a huge "EXACTLY" moment when I read the following paragraphs in The New York Times.
I've added my comments in red.
I've added my comments in red.
ARTS & LEISURE
Black-and-White Struggle With a Rosy Glow
Published: August 9, 2011
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Nelson George is a filmmaker and author. His novel, “The Plot Against Hip Hop,” and documentary, “Brooklyn Boheme,” will both be released this fall.
A larger problem for anyone interested in the true social drama of the era is that the film’s candy-coated cinematography and anachronistic super-skinny Southern belles are part of a strategy that buffers viewers from the era’s violence. The maids who tell Skeeter their stories speak of the risks they are taking, but the sense of physical danger that hovered over the civil rights movement is mostly absent. It reminds me of the King's Speech - we are focused on this man's speech impediment, when there are Jewish people being slaughtered by the hundreds by Hitler. Heck, there are questions whether the true King George endorsed a policy of appeasement towards Hitler. Medgar Evers is murdered in Jackson during the course of the story, but it is more a TV event, very much like the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, than a felt tragedy. The only physical violence inflicted on any of the central characters is a beating Minny endures at the hands of a heard, but unseen, husband. Of course, out of all the lynchings, beatings, and cruelty in the South - the only violence is black-on-black domestic abuse. One of the only black marital relationships we read about in the book. At its core the film is a small domestic drama that sketches in the society surrounding its characters but avoids looking into the shadows just outside the frame.
To protect viewers, sometimes at profound damage to the historical record, white heroes are featured and sometimes concocted for these movies, giving blacks a supporting role in their own struggle for liberation. Exactly! Films of this stripe are legion, though the most irritating example remains“Mississippi Burning,” in which two F.B.I. agents are at the center of an investigation into the murder of civil rights activists. It was a bitter pill for movement veterans to swallow since the agents’ boss, J. Edgar Hoover, was as vicious an opponent as any Southern Dixiecrat. Though not as egregious, both Rob Reiner’s “Ghosts of Mississippi” and the adaptation of John Grisham’s “A Time to Kill” fit this formula.
The other Hollywood fallback strategy when dealing with the movement (or race-themed film set in any period) is to employ “the Magic Negro,” a character whose function is to serve as a mirror so that the white lead can see himself more clearly, sometimes at the expense of the black character’s life. Sidney Poitier’s selfless convict in “The Defiant Ones”was probably the definitive Magic Negro role, though the formula has survived decades, from Will Smith’s God-like caddy in “The Legend of Bagger Vance” up to Jennifer Hudson’s helpful secretary in “Sex and the City” — just a few incarnations of this timeless saint.
I wish I had more words for how I was feeling and why I feel the way that I do, but every time I go to write something it feels wrong, over exaggerated, or simply "off" - so I will allow the previous paragraphs express (for now) some of my observations of the Civil Rights movie "formula."
To protect viewers, sometimes at profound damage to the historical record, white heroes are featured and sometimes concocted for these movies, giving blacks a supporting role in their own struggle for liberation. Exactly! Films of this stripe are legion, though the most irritating example remains“Mississippi Burning,” in which two F.B.I. agents are at the center of an investigation into the murder of civil rights activists. It was a bitter pill for movement veterans to swallow since the agents’ boss, J. Edgar Hoover, was as vicious an opponent as any Southern Dixiecrat. Though not as egregious, both Rob Reiner’s “Ghosts of Mississippi” and the adaptation of John Grisham’s “A Time to Kill” fit this formula.
The other Hollywood fallback strategy when dealing with the movement (or race-themed film set in any period) is to employ “the Magic Negro,” a character whose function is to serve as a mirror so that the white lead can see himself more clearly, sometimes at the expense of the black character’s life. Sidney Poitier’s selfless convict in “The Defiant Ones”was probably the definitive Magic Negro role, though the formula has survived decades, from Will Smith’s God-like caddy in “The Legend of Bagger Vance” up to Jennifer Hudson’s helpful secretary in “Sex and the City” — just a few incarnations of this timeless saint.
I wish I had more words for how I was feeling and why I feel the way that I do, but every time I go to write something it feels wrong, over exaggerated, or simply "off" - so I will allow the previous paragraphs express (for now) some of my observations of the Civil Rights movie "formula."
