How About a List of Movies We All Want to Watch?

So...

With all the angry fighting and yelling about health care on the news lately, I have been re-thinking my previous post. Not the content, but perhaps the approach or my knee-jerk reactions.

I have found that while people are usually open to hearing other people's opinions on their opinions, often more work gets done when people work together on a common text. It builds understanding and a foundation for relationship before introducing conflict.

SO, as a fun exercise, I have decided to assemble a list of films both "liberals" and "conservatives" would enjoy watching. Films that hold common assumptions and lessons appreciated by all people.



This is going to be a work in progress...mainly because I cannot think of many films that espouse a wide range of values.

The first one that comes to mind is "The Lion King". I know, its Disney, which has a sorded history around race and female body image, but this film seems to work around those controversies. The community is harmoniously diverse, Simba learns the importance of leadership and working hard to reach his personal potential in his community and Scar's greed family betrayal kills him. There's a little bit of "work hard to get where you are going" and "family is king" along with "lets make sure everyone has food" and "we learn more from our differences than out similarities".

Can you think of any other movies that are both "conservative" and "liberal" friendly?

A Response to "The Best Conservative Movies"

On February 23rd, 2009, the National Review released their list of The Best Conservative Movies along with explanations for why each pick made the list. While the full article can be found here, there were a few picks and explanations I wanted to respond to:

-The number 2 pick is "The Incredibles". Frederica Mathewes-Greene, a writer for Beliefnet.com, thinks "The Incredibles" is a good conservative movie because it "celebrates marriage, courage, responsibility, and high achievement". While all of this is true, there is an ideological contradiction in Mathewes-Greene's review. She describes the life of the Incredible family as "an anonymous life in the suburbs, thanks to a society that doesn’t appreciate their unique talents". Isn't a life in the "safe haven" of the suburbs one conservatives strive for? I don't think I need to actually find the numbers; suburbia and rural areas are the hot beds of conservative America. So isn't a problem for conservatives that the Incredible family are unhappy in the 'burbs?

-The number 4 pick is "Forest Gump". Charlotte Hays, co-author of the book "Somebody Is Going to Die If Lilly Beth Doesn't Catch That Bouquet", seems to think "Gump" makes a good conservative film only because Forest doesn't fall victim to the "drug-addled hippie" culture like the love of his life does. Fine, fine. What took my breath away was Hay's language. She describes Forest as "an amiable dunce" having an "IQ [that] may be room temperature". While she does give him credit for serving "as an unexpected font of wisdom", if Forest was her son, would Hays still call him an "amiable dunce"?

-Number 7 pick is "The Pursuit of Happiness". Linda Chavez, chairman (isn't Linda a woman?) of the Center for Equal Opportunity, loves this film for three reasons:"this film provides the perfect antidote to Wall Street and other Hollywood diatribes depicting the world of finance as filled with nothing but greed", the character Chris "Gardner never succumbs to self-pity, even when he and his young son take refuge in a homeless shelter" and "They’re black, but there’s no racial undertone or subtext". While no one is going to disagree that the movie is incredible and Gardner deserves huge snaps for being "an incredibly hard-working, ambitious, and smart man who wants to do better for himself and his son", there are some things Chavez misses about this story-mainly the preface and post-script. While Gardner doesn't talk about race much (at least to the press), systems of oppression based on color certainly built circumstances that led to the story in "Happiness". Gardner was motivated to achieve because he did not want to be a part of the illiteracy, imprisonment, alcoholism, abuse and other common by-products of living in an under-served community. During this youth, Gardner developed a sense of Black Pride brought on by the Black Power Movement-something conservatives most certainly would not like. And since Gardner hit it big, he has put millions of dollars behind shelters, job-placement services and basic clothing for Chicago and San Francisco homeless populations. Don't some conservatives believe those things are unwarranted hand-outs?

-While "Juno", the number 8 pick, isn't completely hailed as a conservative homerun, Kathryn Jean Lopez likes is message on abortion, how "it also exposes a broken culture in which teen sex is dehumanizing, girls struggle with 'choice,' and boys aimlessly try — and sometimes downright fail — to become men. The movie doesn’t glamorize much of anything but leaves audiences with an open-ended chance for redemption." But wait, at the end of the film, a now-single Vanessa adopts Juno's baby boy...that's not a nuclear family. Will the baby turn out ok??? Stay tuned.

-"Bravehart" is number 13 on the list. While I've never seen the film, I don't need to because it’s the review that's begging for me to respond. Arthur Herman, author of "How the Scots Invented the Modern World" believes "Braveheart taught that freedom is not just worth dying for, but also worth killing for, in defense of hearth and homeland. Six years [after its release], amid the ruins of the Twin Towers, Gibson’s message resonated with a generation of American youth who signed up to fight terrorists, instead of inviting them to join a 'constructive dialogue.' Liberals have never forgiven Gibson since." Ok, in order to believe constructive dialogue is repulsive enough to shove in between quotes, one has to be confident they are the strongest force, thus making fighting worthwhile. If we were the strongest force in the world, we would have kept 9/11 from happening. So...how do we know we are the best in the world? And 8 years later, with a failing economy and two unwon conflicts, are we the best?

-The final movie on the list is "Gran Torino". Andrew Breitbart, the proprietor of BigHollywood.Breitbart.com, likes the movie because "Dirty Harry blows away political correctness, takes on the bad guys, and turns a boy into a man in the process. He even encourages the cultural assimilation of immigrants." But two sentences before this quote, Breitbart acknowledges that Eastwood's character "comes to realize that his exotic Hmong neighbors embody traditional social values more than his own disaster of a Caucasian nuclear family." So...how does Eastwood's character encourage cultural assimilation in a family that lives closer to American "ideals" than his own? I'm confused. Breitbart closes his review of "Torino" by saying that the film "feels so good, you knew the Academy would ignore it." Or maybe the Academy was confused too.

'Funny People', Diverse Men

Ok, so 'Funny People' isn't really that funny. But that is ok, I didn't really expect it to be. I actually really appreciate a serious movie about comedy; what it means, why we use it, what we think is funny and why.

The reason I am blogging about 'FP' is Apatow's ability to write white male characters (in this case, Jew as an ethnicity counts a white...although I will get to that as well). Let me first say that although I'm over then, the plethora of dick/ball/cock jokes has to mean something...and I think it signifies American male's uneasiness with their gender identity. Apatow then uses that uneasiness to set up his wide array of male characters. On one side of the spectrum you have the seemingly soul-less, lover of penis humor Sandler character. This guy swears and has sex more frequently than he drinks water. His foil is Seth Rogan's quiet, sensitive and a bit unconfident character who wants to wait two months before doing a woman (what a gentleman). The men in between are a little cocky, a little dirty and both have their lives figured out and are in limbo at the same time. I imagine that if I were a man, I would find a guy in this movie that I would identify with. And that I would like.

Well, as long as I am a white guy. The totality of the men of color in this movie are a black ex-convict who calls his friends 'nigger' and his wife 'bitch' and an India guy who swaggers (I mean) swaggas and talks like a gangster (ugh, I did it again!)-gangasta. REALLY JUDD?!

REALLY?!?!?! I get that white men are your target audience but, BOO.

He also deals with ethnicity in an Australian man who seems to be pretty much like Sandler's character (I didn't make that up-they said it in the movie!) and all the Jewish characters. But the Jew men really just use their Jewness to make jokes about bar mitzvah. And body hair.

Bottom line: If you are a nice white guy looking for some affirmation, go see it. If you are interested in thinking about why we laugh and what we laugh at, so see it. Just leave once the airport scene starts 'cause the movie goes downhill from there.

Why These Films Now?

If you have been to a children's movie anytime in the last few months, it is clear that aliens abound. "Aliens in the Attic" was just released. James Cameron's "Avatar" will be out in December. "Race to Witch Mountain" was released in March. "Shorts"-a film about a magic rock from the sky no one can control-is coming out this fall. And DreamWorks' latest children's film was "Mosters v. Aliens" in 2008. There may be a reason for that. In uneasy economic and social times, film theory 101 dictates audiences will respond to movies about outside forces they do not understand and cannot control. That is one of the main theories about the popularity of Alfred Hitchcock...cause, you know, '60s and '70s America wasn't the most stable of times.

But Hitchcock was also about scare and gore. That too, seems to resonate with our current sociopolitical realities. According to the April 2009 "Atlantic" article entitled "Don't Fear the Reaper: Learning to Love the Slasher-Film Renaissance" by James Parker, there is a specific reason we are seeing a resurgence of slasher flicks. Parker cites filmmakers that believe "horror tends to boom in wartimes, and...our lately renewed interest in torn flesh has the same relation to Iraq that 'The Texas Chain Saw Massacre' and 'The Last House on the Left' [both of which have been remade many times...and recently] had to Vietnam". Along with the war uneasiness, there is a streak of end of the world freak-out that comes with a post-9/11 America. Blood and gore (that would be the noun, not former popular vote President-elect) speaks to that as well. Parker, like many film theorists, believes one of the main threads of slasher films is "civilization collapse [and] the rending of the established order"...even all the way back to Beowulf.

True story on the Beowulf. Parker even breaks it down for you. I know you are dying to read it.

Because Everyone Else Is Talking About It...

About the Gates case:

1. Who was the ignorant Harvard professor neighboor that assumed they may be breaking in?
2. The Po po should have calmed down.
3. Gates needs to get off his high horse and kept his mouth shut, saving the story for his next book instead of playing the "how dare you not know who I am " card...because he makes it sound like this is about his ego, not his race.
4. Obama should have known better than to use the word "stupid".
5. I am THRILLED he is setting an example about conversation. Can they do a press conference and model how its done for the rest of us?

Is it Actually Documented that People of Color are Lazier than Whites?

UGH. It happened again.

Last week, President Obama delivered an address about personal responsibility to a room full of "an audience of several thousand people, most of them black, clad in tuxedos and ball gowns, who had gathered in a ballroom of the Hilton New York to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People" or the NAACP, according to the New York Times.

President Obama's "wanted to send a message to black parents, and especially to black children." His speech warned "black parents that they must accept their own responsibilities by 'putting away the Xbox and putting [their] kids to bed at a reasonable hour,' and telling black children that growing up poor is no reason to get bad grades."

Now, why in the heck did he waste his speech at the NAACP talking about personal responsibility?
1. We've heard this speech before.
2. Would he have given this message to the Daughters of the American Revolution National Convention? My guess is 'no'. Why would he do it here? It will be extremely easy for [insert powerful, ignorant white person] to point to this speech and say "Well, President Obama knows black people would be better off if they just worked harder, so what is wrong with my [racist] views?" I'm not opposed to criticism of the black community, but is it documented anywhere that people of color are actually lazier than white people?
3. That dinner, which was attended by black people in tuxes and ball gowns, probably cost a thousand dollars a plate. Those people must have some responsibility if they can amass that amount of money.

This lets-send-a-message-in-the-wrong-package stuff is getting old.

I'm Not Gonna Honk for Honky

Dr. Conley came to Hamline this year and his frankness about his whiteness and life-long class journey was refreshing. It's nice to have a white person talk about whiteness every once in a while.

Although Dr. Conley has written a number of books, the one given to me is his autobiography/memoir/personal sociological musings called Honky. Long story short: he was a white kid living in the (mostly black) projects of NYC and attending schools with rich, bohemian white kids. He grew up, realized he was white and he wasn't rich. Some illegal activities and lots of musing ensue. Basically, it was what I image Mike Reynolds' book would be...but set in NYC instead of NYmiddleofnowhere.

It's not a long or hard read. I thought there were a few funny parts. But for a person of color who always has to think about class and race, I could have done without. I heard enough of this already.

But if you are white and you are looking for language to talk about your race and class realities (or you know a white person who needs some help talking about their race and class realities) this book is for you. It would be a great summer reading for first year students, or a text in a First Year Seminar.

Some things I underlined:
-"...race and class are nothing more than a set of stories we tell ourselves to get through the world, to organize our reality" (xiv).
-the "ultimate sin in American society: downward [class] mobility" (33).
-the idea of the "ritual of consumption": "I grew addicted to shopping. I had never realized how empowering it felt to spend money" (92-3).

Sunday Morning Cartoon: Another Message Lost in Translation

Comedy can be one of the most productive ways to talk about race and class. The genre depends on using situations accessible to large numbers of people, which is often the first challenge in race work. The intended levity allows people to hide their feelings of discomfort, anger or confusion behind laughter. And if someone gets offended, well, we can always claim they just didn't "get the joke", thus making the problem theirs and not our own.

Comic strips are just one of a million ways social critics can talk about our everyday realities. This comic was featured in the Chicago Tribune today, June 28th, 2009. The name of the strip is "Watch Your Head" and it is written and illustrated by Atlanta-based (and Trinidadian-born) artist Cory Thomas. For more information about Thomas, visit his website: www.plantcory.com.

My reading of the comic is this: One rich and academically non-gifted college student comes home for the summer to a mother who wants him to be responsible for his bad grades and a father who not only does not hold his son responsible for his bad grades, but refuses to do so because he believes that is a behavior attributed to middle class peoples.

Ok, so the idea of a father not wanting to raise his kid "middle-class" while dressed in a suit and talking about a yacht and vacation house (two things that require more than middle-class standing to obtain) is illogical, thus the joke. And I get the social commentary here. Although I don't think that personal responsibility is the only thing that will enable people to move up to, or maintain their standing in, the middle class, it certainly helps.

But what leaves me scratching my head is that I read this in the Chicago Tribune, a paper that is very expensive (as far as newspapers go) and is pretty clearly targeted towards middle-class audiences. So...why that content in a middle-class paper? So middle class blacks (and whites and people of colors for that matter) can be given more reason to look down on non-middle class peoples? Perpetuate the myth of the American dream?

(Thomas, according to his website, is a two-degree recipient of Howard University, a school known by reputation for being exceedingly bent on producing middle-class citizen and unforgiving of everything else. But this is a side bar...who knows what is on Thomas' mind?)

Yeah, ok, "Watch Your Head" is run in papers besides the Trib. Infact, here is the list (according to Thomas' website): Chicago Tribune (IL), Washington Post (DC), Boston Herald (MA), New York Newsday (NY), St. Petersburg Times (FL), Florida Times Union (FL), Dallas Morning News (TX), The Charlotte Observer (NC), The New Mexican (NM), LINK/Virginian-Pilot (VA), Stockton Record (CA), The Kenosha News (WI), Highland Park Mirror (NJ), The Cleveland News Leader (MS) and Trinidad Guardian (TT). I know nothing about any of these papers except the Trib, Post and Herald. And those three, I think, serve pretty much the same purpose just in different geographical locatations.

This feels like yet another in a long line of calls for the lower black classes to assume personal responsibility (see President Obama's 2009 Father's Day Speech, Cosby and Pouissant's 2007 Come on People: On the Path from Victims to Victors or Shelby Steele and any self-proclaimed black conservitive). The message, of course is good. When isn't a message of personal responsibility good?

But we do seem to hear it more directed towards populations of color than not. There is a reason for that: it's a numbers game. White populations are not telling each other to pull it together because there are a lot more of them than populations of color. There are so many people, there will always be a supply of white individuals to take those topsspots. In the case of white America, it would be counter productive for cultural leaders to call for personal empowerment.

So while these "call to action" speeches and campagins are needed and encouraging, there is no way to make them not feel awkward. One of the criticisms of these speeches, ralleys and campaigns is that they are embarrsing, they shoot a spotlight on communities already struggling. I don't know how to avoid that. Since whiteness defines normalitiy, anything that our mainstream culture doesn't do is going to be abnormal. And while our culture endlessly produces sublte messages about the American dream and bootstraps, it is not the same stark image of this comic.

What I find more embarrasing is when these "get your act together" messages come in completely illogical packages. Thomas writing a comic strip aimed at lower-class black populations in a middle-class newspaper? Cosby, Pouissant, and Steele writing dense and expensive books to parents they chide for not reading enough? Please. The only people getting these kinds of messages are middle class people who will either further their belief of "the lazy black syndrome" or look at these out of touch cultural critics with the same mix of pitty and disgust the critics look at poor populations. And things continue on the way they were before.