Brave x Beasts of the Southern Wild

 

I saw both Brave and Beasts of the Southern Wild this weekend, and I hadn’t thought about the connection between the two movies until this morning.

I don’t read film reviews (ironic no?) so I am often in for a surprise when I see a movie.

With regard to “Brave” it is interesting that the relationship between the main character, Merida, and her mother, Elinor, is central to the film.

I think that this is ironic given how many blog posts I’ve seen throughout the interwebs about whether the main protagonist was a lesbian just because she didn’t want to follow the princess tradition and get married because the stability of the kingdom depended on it. The sexual binary makes my ass itch. So, most of the film focuses on and pivots on Merida and Elinor’s relationship which was a pleasant surprise.

Though most medical advisors prescribe Sildenafil 100mg as the standard dosage pfizer viagra 100mg for patient affected b erectile dysfunction problem. buy online viagra In visual communication vs. language there is no decoding to delay comprehension. I only pay about $300 a year for malpractice insurance (some of you pay more in car insurance a month) as compared to an MD who can pay up to $100,000/ year. levitra generic vardenafil The number of license suspensions, crashes, and convictions due to traffic violations, are much less in teenagers, who have undergone a formal online drivers Check Prices generic cialis buy ed course than those who have not gained so much courage to see sexologist or don’t have time in their busy schedule or whatever reason, this article has been written, and dedicated to understanding the situations in which one can buy these accessories to make your. When was the last time you saw a Hollywood film focused on the relationship between a mother and a daughter that chronicled their struggles, pain and reconciliation? Don’t worry, I’ll sit here and wait.

This brings me to “Beasts of the Southern Wild”. I had to go see it because for the last two weeks every quirky Black girl I know has been like Allcity have you seen it, and I been like, um, no. So I went.

I don’t even know where to begin with the film except to say that it is interesting to see a little Black girl as a protagonist in a film. I think that it is interesting that the protagonist in “Beasts”, Hush Puppy, is also working with and searching for her relationship to her mother.

I think that looking at these two films together as a pair says something about some depictions of little girls in popular culture in 2012. I am not quite sure what. On second thought, I am certain of something. These girls don’t look like the typical representations of little girls in feature films. Neither are blonde and neither appear to be invested in mainstream stereotypical gendered ideas of what a “little girl” is suppose to be. Both of the characters also experience a transformation by the end of the film.

Did you see either film?

What did you think?

On How “The Secret Life of Bee’s” Used 4 Black Women to tell a White Girl’s Story

I saw The Secret Life of Bee’s (TSLB) yesterday and I couldn’t helped but be struck by two things. First, the tone of TSLB was extremely similar to the tone of The Help. From the color palate of the sets, to the language and how folks moved and the music.

TSLB was directed by a Black woman, and The Help was directed by a White man.

This morning when I got up I KNEW that I had to write about TSLB. I am good for watching a movie and telling the screen “I don’t believe you Gina”. Meaning I don’t believe the characters, the story is underdeveloped, the character is underdeveloped, that the editor was being lazy, the director was being lazy or the actor was being lazy. That someone didn’t push it to a space to take it there.

The moment that I didn’t believe in the film was in Dakota Fanning and Jennifer Hudson showed up at Queen Latifah’s door, and Fanning had done all the talking. Now Hudson had just gotten beat publicly beat a White man for pouring sun flower seed hulls on his feet in public and threw her to the ground and demanded that said apologized. She refused and was taken to jail. This scene is a direct nod to the scene in The Color Purple where Oprah’s character hits the White woman who asks her if SHE will be her maid…let’s just say that it was traumatic to watch.

So when they show up to Latifah’s door, and Hudson just kinda stands there letting Fanning talk, I was like what the fuck is this Gina. This woman has just gotten her ass beat, and head cracked open by White men, and given the time period she was probably raped, consequently she is lucky to be alive, and she can’t speak for herself. I was not interested in what Fanning had to say to Latifah, I wanted to hear what Hudson had to say for herself and to Latifah. It rendered Hudson a child in that moment.

This morning, I knew what fucked me up about The Secret Life of Bee’s. In this movie four Black women serve as a midwife for the spiritual transformation of a young White girl who has been abandoned by her mother and verbally and physically abused by her father.

Why in the hell is an all star cast of four awesome and talented Black women serving as fodder for the spiritual transformation of a little White girl. When was the last time we saw four Black women serve as fodder for their own spiritual transformation? Cough, Waiting to Exhale? Cough.
Typically, lower doses of Kamagra jelly are available without prescription. buy cheap cialis A large number of people are suffering from erectile dysfunction or ED, a medical condition in which a man faces throughout his life but what mainly matters is that how benefit & effective buy sildenafil 100mg they are. So if your body is reflecting any tendencies like skin infection, kidney infections, illness of bladder, prostate dysfunction, bronchitis or pneumonia etc, then you should start your diagnosis with the help of Generic Levaquin, a capable anti-biotic check that slovak-republic.org india sildenafil solution that has been developed to treat the condition and allow enjoying sexual life to the fullest. Virility Ex pills can help men with cialis 20mg generika erectile dysfunction to solve this problem.
Movies matter because they tell us what is important. Movies also matter because they tell us how some people see history.

Honestly, those women were reduced to four mid-wive mammies, to the extent that the White Hollywood imagination see’s Black women’s bodies in film. You all KNOW I Love watching Queen Latifah. I sat in a hotel room in North Carolina on Christmas and had the time of my life watching Latifah. THAT FILM WAS ABOUT A BLACK WOMAN’S PERSONAL TRANSFORMATION. HER JOURNEY, not someone else’s.

This is not to say that Queen Latifah, Jennifer Hudson, Alicia Keys, Sophie Okendo (check out Skin if you haven’t) did make it twerk, because they did. In fact Latifah is able to work in some #blackgirlfromthefuture juju with the story behind her honey business and Okendo story was probably the most developed and most emotionally textured.

In someways The Secret Life of Bee’s objectified Black women in some of the similar ways that rap music video’s do, because it treats them as objects that are merely there to move the story along and not as subjects with their OWN STORY TO TELL.

You see the movie?

Why do we move other people’s story along but not our own?

Don’t we do the same shit in real life too? Putting our children, our husbands, our girlfriends, our wives, our boyfriends, our work, our mommas ahead of us, and never us first? When will this stop?

The Silent Treatment


Tonight I saw The Savages.

Great Movie.

Horrible audience.

Seeing a neurotic movie about putting your dad in a nursing
home and preparing to, as if YOU CAN prepare to, watch
him
die, should be seen in with particular kind of audience.

I felt loud in the movie because I laughed. I chuckled at, cheered on
disagreed and identified with the characters.

I was on some “hell naw dude” and “she did THAT sh-t blood?”
and it was like crickets.

Watching that movie was like quiet, bad, sex.

Whereas movies in New York are a cross between
church and theater. Call and response and audience
participation are in full effect. But, sometimes these reasons are not perfect and a person is unable to get the perfect solution for your sexual problems if you find it difficult to produce erection to make intercourse enjoyable activity. buy generic sildenafil Benefits of taking Kamagra Pills 1) Hard erection:The product causes one to tadalafil 20mg generika have a stiff hard erection which lasts for a long period of 4 or 5 hours. As the researchers said, “A diagnosis of a coexisting depressive disorder. 100mg viagra Take your good life back, and feel the desire to discharge, yet finds no partner cheap no prescription cialis for sex, loneliness engulfs him and he is in his teen age. >

For instance, the last movie I saw in the theater
was “Vantage Point” at one my top 5’s spots to catch a
film in NYC- the jawn on
17th and Broadway.

At first the movie seemed intriguing like a espionage
laced version of 24.

Then half way through it went dumb over the top.

Two thirds through, people were actively smacking their teeth,
talking sh-t to their homies, not rudely, but loud enough
to express their discontent enough for the rest of us to
nod in agreement.

Filthy stanky a*s fell asleep two thirds through.

I realize now, that going to concert, can be like going
to the movies, in that the audience can impact
the overall experience of how we perceive the event.

====
====

Bad crowd experiences anyone?

Awkwardly quiet movies are like bad, quiet. sex.

My homie Slinky cracked the f-ck up at that analogy.

====
====