I recoiled when I saw the poster for The Blind Side. I didn't read the book, but I did read the excerpt in the NY Times, which I liked a lot because Michael Lewis is, well, brilliant. But when I found out the film was coming all I could think was "No way am I seeing that." To some extent I think it has to do with a longstanding beef about how blacks show up in movies. So many of our roles involve us as these kind of disconnected aliens without much attachment to a community. In a lot of those roles we're often "saved" by the benevolence of white folks.
Denzel is probably one of the most popular black men in black America, and I think a lot of that has to do with the fact that, in his movies, he so often has his ties to black people on display. His wife is usually black, or he may have kids or a brother who's black. In The Pelican Brief he even rocked the Howard Law sweat-shirt. The sense has been that, though he's walking into the world of "them," he's always repped for "us." He's always been about demonstrating that there's a black community that produced him.
It's not fair to bring that kind of prejudice, or these kinds of expectations, to bear on The Blind Side. First and foremost, there is no one story, no one kind of narrative. Everyone doesn't find that kind of support in their community. Some people are, indeed, "saved" by white folks. (You could make an argument for me.) People have the right to tell those stories. I do think, to an extent, this is about how whites often encounter blacks--as individuals and not in the presence of their full community. More than that, I think it's about how I see the world, and the desire to see films that reflect that.
But like I said, it isn't right to put that sort of pressure on people who are just trying to tell a story. If I don't like it, I should go tell my own. Meh. I guess I have to go see the film, now.
The Beautiful Struggle: A Father, Two Sons, and an Unlikely Road to Manhood 
Copyright © 2009 by The Atlantic Monthly Group. All rights reserved.
As a Ravens fan, I of course know about Michael Oher. However, I have to admit when I saw Sandra Bullock in that blonde hair (which I thought was a wig) and the Fray playing in the background, I really thought the trailer was a joke. I totally was expecting a Wayans bro to show up.
I read the book a few years ago when it came out, but when Oher was drafted I insisted my wife read it. She loved it and bought an Oher jersey to wear when we went to the game a few weeks ago against the Bengals. She really wants to go see it, so I think it's unfortunately unavoidable. I just asked her not to wear her jersey to the movie.
There are two good reasons not to see this movie: Tim McGraw and Sandra Bullock.
As a Raven's fan I am tempted to see it. I might just go for the book instead. I'm assuming it's more insightful from the football standpoint than the movie will be.
The book is great. I can't imagine the movie going as in-depth into the history of the left tackle and the roles of Lawrence Taylor and Bill Walsh in making it what it is today. Also, another bonus for Ravens fans, there's a good bit about Ogden in it.
I saw this trailer recently when my wife and I went to the movies. And my mouth literally dropped, I was shocked. I turned to my wife and said "Really?" "We're still making movies like this?" It's one thing to say that this kind of story has a right to be told, but there are two kinds of Hollywood movies about black people. First, there are the movies like "The Blind Side," the white savior movies. Then, there is, what my friend calls the magic black man movie, such as "The Legend of Bagger Vance," "The Shawshank Redemption" for that matter the majority of Morgan Freeman movies. Both are insulting, ignorant and in the end incredibly boring. I have always had great respect for the films of Charles Burnett, because they depict a black community absent not only of these stereotypes, but also the Boyz n the Hood/Menace to Society ones as well, which is especially relevant when films like "Killer of Sheep" and "To Sleep With Anger" take place in South Central. But, for a white audience to watch these films, they ask "Where are the guns?" "Where are the bangers?" They're in the movies folks, that's where they are.
I don’t know whether it’s unfair to apply those types of ‘prejudices’ to this film or not. Yes, it’s a true story, but I find the trailer almost unwatchable. It’s all swelling orchestral music and southern twang. It feels so sentimental and self-congratulatory. And, yeah, it’s a true story, but it was made into a movie by people who know that this is the kind of story that they can sell to white audiences come Thanksgiving and Christmas time.
Yeah. And I suspect all the rough edges will be gently smoothed off by the end, and anything unique and interesting about the story will be gone.
How accurate is it? Did this woman really save him? If it is true to the story, then I'm not sure what can be said. However, if they've completely added this Sandra Bullock character, it seems to be in poor taste.
No, it's very real. Here's a link. It's not the veracity that I'm questioning. Also, I actually liked the story. This isn't about the story being "wrong," as much as it's about which stories we choose to tell, and which ones we don't.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/24/magazine/24football.html?pagewanted=all
I was aware of Oher's story, but I didn't know the facts of it, or whether this white woman actually existed. Now, I have no interest in seeing it, but I don't think we can be surprised that Hollywood eats this stuff up. Would they have still made it if the offensive tackle was Jake Long? Or Joe Thomas? Or another white, homeless football player? I don't know the answer to that, but I kind of assume they would. But then again, the book might have never been written, and we might not ever be aware if that was the case.
I basically agree with this, hence my tenative tone. But I do think, had the guy been white, there would have been less interest. Michael Oher is not the first person to be "saved"--black atheletes are "saved" all the time by other black people.
I am not arguing for an insidious plot. More likely the cross-racial aspects, the sense of navigating two worlds, allows the film to tug at another set of heart-strings.
I think we can probably all agree that if the story was a black family 'saving' a homeless black football player, it would not be made into a big Hollywood production...
No way this story is made into a movie if the kid is white. Take from that what you will, but there's no doubt in my mind that this movie is not made unless it's a white family helping a black kid. Well, maybe if it was a black family helping the white kid. But white people helping white people to succeed in high school, then college, sports is not going to butts in the seats.
To follow up on TNC's comment that there are plenty of stories in which black athletes are "saved" by other black people - where's the movie about, for example, Ted Ginn Sr
who has been "saving" young black men in Cleveland's inner city for years and who now has established his dream of the Ginn Academy
- a public charter in Cleveland focused on young men in inner city Cleveland and which, now three years in, has graduated all of its students.
There are numerous others such stories and it is a CHOICE to tell the "Blind Side" stories rather than the myriad others where the black COMMUNITY is featured as "savior".
It'll be interesting to see if the black people in the book who helped Oher (like Tony Henderson) are included in the movie.
Michael Oher is not the first person to be "saved"--black atheletes are "saved" all the time by other black people.
No way this story is made into a movie if the kid is white
I think we can probably all agree that if the story was a black family 'saving' a homeless black football player, it would not be made into a big Hollywood production...
I wouldn't expect anything less from a bunch of commenters who, as far as I can tell, never read the book. First off: Hollywoods has a bigger thing for making movies based off of popular books than the ideas I quote above.
Oh and TNC - ever seen "Above the Rim?" It was made 15 years ago. Check it out. I think it's something along the lines of "black people helping other black people."
People are speculating on the movie. Not the book. I assume you haven't seen the movie, either, unless you are somehow involved in its production. Have you seen anyone making any negative comments about how Michael Lewis portrayed the story? The post was about the stories that are chosen to be told. I don't agree that this movie would not have been made if the player was white, but again, this is about the movie being made.
Nobody has seen the movie, which makes a blog post about how the story is told even more ridiculous because most of the comments, and the blog itself, are written by people who have never read the book!!
For example, see this TNC comment:
"But I do think, had the guy been white, there would have been less interest"
Really? So if Michael Lewis, say, wrote a popular book about a white guy there would be no interest, right? Hollywood wouldn't want to make a movie about this white guy, right? And if Michale Lewis didn't want to write a book about a white guy in the first place, well...that says more about the "brilliant" Michael Lewis than us, right?
Well, you said yourself down thread that another interesting aspect of the story is that the kid 'saves' the family from their own prejudices. So you seem to be agreeing that the racial dynamic makes the story more interesting.
Again, though, the point is about what stories Hollywood chooses to tell. Not about what stories Michael Lewis writes about. I don't really think anyone should be surprised at what movies Hollywood decides to make when you see what kind of crap does the best at the box office. I assume that the movie is very little like the book. What movies aren't?
Maybe we should all have a homework project to go see the movie and come back and discuss it. I read 'Moneyball,' and I loved it. And I loved Michael Lewis's piece about Shane Battier. I've already put this on my shopping list at Amazon.
My fundamental point is this, and I'll leave it at this...
Those of us who have read the book clearly know why Michael Lewis wrote it, why it was popular, why it is still popular, and why it is being made into - probably - a cheezy, rundown, second-rate Holywood movie.
And I in no way knew what Blind Side was about before I read it. I though it was about Lawrence Taylor. Couldn't have been more wrong.
Look, I’m not making a value judgment with regard to either the movie or the book. I haven’t read the book. But I freely admit that it’s a nice story of triumph over adversity and acceptance and lot of other nice things. I have never read it, but I will happily accept that it is well-written, and thoughtfully constructed. I will not speak for anyone’s words but my own. My words are that this movie doesn’t get made by a major Hollywood studio without the racial element. This is not about the power of the story. It’s about the power of the story to make money for the studio. It’s about turning the story into a commodity or consumable, to serve it up, and get as many people as possible to devour it. And regardless of whether this is a good story, or whether or not the book was wonderful, as a movie, this thing falls squarely into a well-established modality of American film. One that holds at its center a sincere, but fundamentally sentimental and simplistic view on race that oftentimes borders on the offensive. But regardless of what the book is about (and really, regardless of what the film itself is about) this movie is being marketed to middle-aged white women who want to think themselves capable of saving a gentle black man-child, and bringing him into their home, and giving him a real shot at life. And no, I do not think, from the perspective of the people who greenlit this film, that this movie works without the woman being white and the kid being black. Frankly, I'm surprised that anybody does. I can hardly think of a serious heartwarming sports movie of the past 10 or 15 years that didn't involve a clash of racial cultures subplot. That's not to say that there weren't a couple of them. Just that they weren't as memorable.
It's also the way its told. I mean, how many children could even survive the way Oher did? That's incredible strength. I mean, good on the family for taking him in, but the trailer takes a tone that emphasizes how much this kid needed to be saved, rather than a profile in extraordinary courage.
Excellent point, Dan W. It's not about how one kid saved himself and then excelled with the help of others-- it's about a white woman saving a kid.
I think this is important. Oher survived horrible circumstances on his own until 14-15, and then made the transition to suburban white High School, and college. The ability to transform from the inevitable maladaptions from a childhood dealing with parental neglect to suburban existanceis beyond impressive, and unless the movie shows this, it is disrespectful and misleading.
I think the trailer is pretty cheesy, but to be fair, I think it's mostly looking to showcase star power. So you see a lot of Sandra Bullock, and they squeeze in a bunch of college coaches who probably only have bit roles. But I think that's more of a "hey look who's in this movie that you recognize" thing, and I think the movie could be a lot better than the trailer. Not that that would take much anyway.
I agree that it's about which stories we choose to tell, and also about how we choose to tell those stories. I know it's unfair to judge a movie by it's trailer, but the movie doesn't look like it's anything more than a polished, feel good version of the more complicated true story. The book dealt with a lot of complicated issues revolving around race, poverty, the mercenary aspects of sports, the mixed motives of everyone involved, etc.
Yeah, like I said, I was fan of the excerpt, which I thought was pretty layered. I'd bet the book was more so. The problem is when all that nuance goes away and you end with this almost King-Kong\white woman image.
That poster is terrible. It looks like Beauty and the Beast.
Even having read some of these comments, I was unprepared for the sheer awfulness of the poster. Jesus, was there not a single person who raised a red flag on that one?
And I think Dan W.'s comments get the Win of the Day. It would be interesting to compare how the stories of Precious and Oher are told in those respective movies. My sense is that -- despite my serious misgivings about that film for different reasons -- there is much more focus on Precious's inner strength and courage. I wonder how different that would be if she had been "saved" by a white family. Obviously, they are different books, but from having read the NYT excerpt on Oher, the film version could have been very, very good and not another Dangerous Minds, Family Edition.
I read the book, and I liked it, but I have zero interest in seeing this movie.
The story of my family is, in part, the story of a Black kid who was "saved" by white folks -- but when it's family, it's just family. I mean, my cousin isn't a project, he's just family. Just the cousin who doesn't write enough and STILL hasn't sent me a picture of his new baby, what is wrong with him?! It's hard to explain to people who don't have adoption in their background how family is just, bottom line, family, but it is.
But as we were all growing up, there was also a constant awareness of/respect for the fact that this baby/boy/young man/grown man had a history that the rest of didn't share, family or not, a history from which he should not be removed. My brother and sister and I lived with those cousins for awhile, and I can remember all the efforts to allow avenues into African American heritage and community without making a burden out of difference. This is part of why I am so careful when I try to talk about issues specific to the Black community. It's not my story, even if he is my cousin.
But it also made me more aware, I think, than a lot of suburban white kids growing up in the 70s of the kinds of stereotypes and expectations that white society brings to the cultural table, and this, the need to "save" black folks, is still a very powerful one.
The other one that always jumps out at me is the Magical Negro: If the Negro doesn't need saving, s/he is apparently the savior, and almost always, it is in disconnect from his or her own story -- hell, even The Secret Life of Bees, ostensibly a movie peopled with African Americans, was really a movie peopled with Magical Negroes, all there to save one little white girl. It's all very Subject/Other, and it makes me unhappy, as I think of my new little cousin trying to grow up in a world that still sees her as a bit player in her own society.
I think it's fair to put some of this weight on the storyteller.
I'm a novelist. I'm working on something now that includes, among the side characters, a black family. They're wholly separated from any real black culture or identity. So are the white characters who are at the same level of dramatic importance, but that strikes me as irrelevant; whites can't be used as tokens in a majority white story.
As the (white) storyteller, I guess my options are:
1) Don't write black characters, for fear of offending or misrepresenting. (Which strikes me as pretty much inevitable, and of course holds for all ethnicities about which I'm ignorant, not just blacks.)
2) Include black characters and do my ignorant best.
3) Inform myself.
But #3 is clearly outta the question. I'm a busy man.
Well, okay, it's not outta the question, but it's an ongoing challenge. I've also got some Filipinos and a bunch of Catholics and a gay couple and a deaf kid. Should I drop the ball on some of them, or just ignore everyone who's different? At the end of the day, the question for -me- isn't about ethnicity so much as about the quality of my work. The problem with writing lazy shit that disrespects someone isn't the disrespect; it's the laziness. I'll happily piss on anyone, but only after I've done my homework.
Re: laziness and disrespect. One proceeds from the other. I'm not sure which, though. Just as likely, one is just another way of saying the other.
I don't think so. I'm happy to disrespect my family, and that's not out of laziness. That I _earned_.
If I disrespect _your_ family, though, that's lazy. I don't know enough about your family to disrespect them.
On thinking a little, I was way too glib. Ignorance is definitely a kind of disrespect, if that's the way the causation goes. But I also think that we can disrespect after we -know-. Like the Coen brothers' latest, A Serious Man. Or Portnoy's Complaint, or something.
But maybe my definition of 'disrespect' is a little hazy.
I'm an aspiring novelist. I run into the same problems. I'm especially hesitant on how to write women. Looking at your list of choices, I can only choose from 2 and 3. I'm not sure how to go about option 3 it's not like I don't know plenty its that I'm often remind that I don't know what's going on in there heads the way I do what goes on in a guy's head (irrespective of race and culture) and I'm hesitant to project stereotypes and/or easy conventions.
And the Jack Nicholson line from that movie doesn't help.
Also, as a complete aside, you know of any non-fiction police/intelligence community procedurals? I've got some homework to do as well.
Yeah, gender is tricky, too. Ta-Nehisi's had a couple excellent posts about how it feels to be a man, the 'break your back' posts and others. I think women authors often have trouble writing that, as the lines between masculine passion and violence and enthrallment are so blurry. I make my wife read all my women with a critical eye, but I suspect they're all variations on her. And in my latest, I've got this v. awkward anti-feminist subtext that just kinda popped out at me.
For police procedural stuff, my very favorite is Miles Corwin's 'The Killing Season'. An excellent, excellent book. Never found one I liked as much, re. intelligence, but I'll try to remember the titles of some good ones.
Thanks.
David Simon's Homicide: A Year on the Killing Streets. I'm not sure how much of a procedural you'd call it but it's very good and informative.
Awesome. Thanks.
Police, definitely. HOMICIDE, the book that got the whole David Simon ball rolling, is simply an excellent police procedural. Not sure about a non-fiction intelligence community procedural at the moment.
If you have any interest in character development (i.e., you want to do more than crank out sub-standard* genre fiction), then develop the characters.
That's it. Have your characters be real people, not types, not representations, not The Black Guy and The Woman and the Deaf Person, etc.
Give your character a name and a personality, and let her tell you who she is.
It's not woo, it's not complicated, it's not perfection. Just pay attention to that particular character.
(*Please note the beef is with the sub-standard, not the genre. There is also very good genre fiction---which often has real characters.)
I really enjoyed the book, but one of the things I liked about it was Lewis getting into the moral ambiguity of taking in a talented poor kid into your wealthy family for the purpose of helping a predominantly white High School win football games.
It was good for Oher, it was good for the School. It smacks of something unsavory, something exploitive. I don't doubt the mutual affection between the Tuohys and himself. However, any attempt to replicate this is morally questionable.
Agreed-- another very uncomfortable dynamic. In the end, I wasn't sure whether this was a happy story or not (probably: yes in the micro, maybe not in the macro)
Yes, there was lots of ambiguity. This is not to say that the Tuohys didn't do good things for him and that they didn't come to care for him as a person at all, but it was damn clear that if he hadn't been a hell of a prospective player for Ole Miss that it never would have happened.
Somehow I suspect very little of that is going to get into the movie.
This. Man, this rang a bell in me. I have nothing but anecdotal evidence but every time I get someone white to, in good faith, imagine themselves living as I do, as a different one in a sea of others, they are shocked (in a good way) by it.
For example, my boss said he liked soul food and reminisced fondly about the restaurant "Georgia" that used to be open on Melrose. I said that I thought Georgia was faux soul food and that we should go have lunch at M&Ms; there's one on Crenshaw I think. He said that he'd stick out there...he may not be that comfortable. I told him to "Man up, I do it every day. Look around. Nothing but white folks as far as the eye can see...and me." And he tilted his head and said "Why, so you do. I never thought of that."
It's the same for films. Much as I think Tyler Perry can do better, in a storytelling sense (and good God use your gazillions for that Tyler), I can't find it in myself to rag too much on his efforts. I enjoy them for what they are...over and over and over again. The one part I find supremely enjoyable about them is that it's nothing but black folks as far as the eye can see.
"I never thought of that"? Seriously?
Jeezus.
Some people are brought up so frakkin' sheltered. I bet your boss grew up with his mom and dad, played some sports, never felt like an outsider in high school or at any other time of his life. I used to envy people like that. But they seem incapable of standing in another fellow's shoes.
He never, once, looked around a conference table at work and saw one black face and wondered what that's like? Wow.
Meh. My boss is a good guy. I'm not mad at him for not realizing. It is what it is. He answered in good faith and honestly and henceforth, I would hope he at least notices. I think he does, particularly since I'm here to remind him.
I would also submit, as a possibility, that there is something else going on in that poster that may or may not be intentional, to wit:
We are conditioned in America to see large Black men as threatening, particularly if we happen to be tiny white women like Sandra Bullock. Part of the heart-string pulling going on in the poster is, to my mind, a version of: "Hey look! This tiny white woman and this enormous Black man are clearly very fond of each other! Tiny white woman not afraid of enormous Black man! Isn't that heartwarming?" People who design film posters are trying to fit so much information into such a narrow medium -- I think the folks behind this movie tried to fit "heartwarming" into the poster via "we've turned the expectation of fear and loathing on its ear."
Which I'm frankly sure they saw/see as a positive (and probably any subversion of a culture of fear and loathing is a good thing), but when seen out of all context, it's... unfortunate.
TNC - while I was typing, you commented about the King Kong/white woman image in the poster. That's absolutely part of what I'm seeing here.
Just like they did with all the Beethoven movies.
"this is about how whites often encounter blacks--as individuals and not in the presence of their full community. "
Is this a good thing in your view? Is this different than the need to recognize people's humanity which you write on often?
My instinctive response is "wouldn't it be great if we were all encountered as individuals and people were left with no choice but to judge us based on said encounter" then some other part of me thinks that my instinctive response is incredibly naive.
Also, pick up the Blind Side. Its a quick read. Its not only great story about Oher, its a great and accessible history of the West Coast offense, and the development of several positions in football (QB, OLB/DE and left tackle). And there's this great moment with Dwight Freeney near the end of the book that I think about everytime I see Freeney on the field.
I don't know if it's a good thing, it's basically an unavoidable thing. People so often forget that there are relatively few black people in this country. So chances are if you encounter one, you'll encounter him/her as an individual. I don't know how to change that. The math is what it is.
Re: The Blind Side. I wish I could. I'm swamped with reading right now. There was a lot of that in the excerpt though.
Funny that reminds me of my litmus test for interracial dating: "ok, youre willing to crush on, lust for or love someone of a different race--but would you befriend their same-sex version?" Its ok to be Black and love hot Korean girls, but would you as effortlessly make friends with a cool Korean guy? Its ok to be white and date handsome Black men exclusively, but do you have problems getting along with Black women? (Not just the ones who hate on you for 'stealing their men').
Dont just embrace me as an attractive individual, but as a member of a family, a culture, a community--and then we might be getting somewhere. Doesnt mean you are as accountable to the collective as you are to me, or that I will make you work to please my aunties all day, but it is an invaluable demonstration of respect and empathy that counts a bunch in my book
I'm eager to read the book, but I'm curious: How did Lawrence Taylor change the way people played the game, and the importance of the left tackle position? LT was before my time.
Regarding the movie, I saw a commercial for it and I wondered, What's Sandra Bullock doing in a made-for-TV movie? I thought it was a Hallmark movie, I couldn't believe it was going to be released in theaters!
LT was a new breed (yikes - what a loaded word) of outside linebacker. He was bigger and, even more importantly, faster than anyone the league had ever seen before. Before then, DE's/OLB's tended to be big and slow. QB's literally lived in fear of him coming from their "blind side" and thus were afraid to stay in the pocket. He caused more than a few serious QB injuries and completely threw off team's game plans. Since most qb's are right-handed, their blind-side is protected by the left tackle. They end up having to deal with Jevon Kearse/LT/etc. After LT, left tackle became one of the most important, and highly-paid, positions on the every team.
Blind side tackles are generally the second highest paid guys on the team, next to the QB. Or so the book says.
I'd like to co-sign everything rookie said about the new breed of pass rushers. But the book is so great because it first talks about what made the LT style pass rusher so important. Once the West Coast offense was brought into the game and there was more passing and bigger aerial attacks, QBs became more vital and therefore the pass rush became more vital and therefore the blind side tackle became more vital as a counter to pass rush which was itself a counter to passing game. Like an intrasport arms race. Very cool read.
Most famously, he ended Joe Theismann's career with a spectacular broken leg on a sack.
The book itself is vastly more nuanced than this movie looks to be - but I heard the trailer on the radio and hearing Sandra Bullock's voice made me certain I would not be seeing it.
In the book, which I feel like I read a long time ago, I think the main characters express a great ambivalence about what they're doing. Everyone accuses them of using Oher for personal gain.
But I think the movie is likely to be like Friday Night Lights: whereas that book was about how racist Texans were, the movie was about football. This movie will similarly gloss over societal flaws in favor of the story of a good football player. How that could make an interesting movie is beyond me.
I can't begrudge this film since it is based in fact. But like TNC and others I question why this is the dominant narrative about black folks.
Then again, I guess I really don't question it--movies/plays/music provide catharsis. What better catharsis for our trouble racial past is there than stories about white folks redeeming black folks (and themselves for taking part in and/or benefitting from past oppression).
And in Morgan Freeman's defense, he did star in the one of the few (and quite possibly the best) black folks saving black folks movie ever made, Lean on Me.
It's also a little strange that this is coming out sort of close to "Precious" a film about a girl who is saved by black people. In the trailer Oher is a sad giant, who needs white people to not only save him but save him through teaching him to use his black body to his and their advantage where as Precious's body onscreen has become an object for white reviewers to project their collective disgust onto.
I don't know - I just saw "Precious" last night. I don't know if "saved" is the right word for what happens to her. I know we can't get into it without spoilers for the rest, but...even though they end it vaguely there's only one way her situation wraps up(it's 1988 in the movie, after all).
But I get your point, nonetheless.
I dont know if saved is the right word either exactly, I have not seen the film but I read the book and I felt that the future was entirely uncertain because of the changing nature of the systems in NYC to support people with their education goals.
Hmmmm. I wonder if the book and the movie have the same ending.
What I find really unfortunate is that crazy image in the movie poster (are their true physical dimensions that opposite?) coupled with the narrative about a football player named "Oher" which I misread several times as "Other."
Yeah, they are. Offensive tackles tend to be some of the biggest players on the field.
Here's a pic from real life:
http://goodnewsintulsa.com/images/clip_image001_0008.jpg
Although Sandra Bullock is 5'7", so I'm not sure if they just found an actor who was proportionally taller to preserve the disparity, or they tried to play it up for the poster. It's an interesting point though.
Gah, I just looked at the poster. Given a 5'7" Sandra Bullock, and comes up to the bottom of the shoulder pad (while looking up), I'd say the actor is 6'7" at a minimum. (ok, I looked it up - he's 6'10").
So it looks like the actor really is that much taller than the actress, but given the other pic, Michael Oher is not that much taller than Leanne Tuohy.
Since I lived in Atlanta for the last several years, I heard about this locally before it became a national story. As such, I never tried to impart a great deal of "deep moral significance" to what these folks did, beyond the fact that they saw a kid in need and took him into their home and, eventually, their family. The fact that they were rich and white and he was poor and black were secondary to the fact that they gave a shit about somebody and did a great deal more than write a "pity check" worked for me.
I think people feel that the family did a fine thing, and that they deserve praise for it. I think the fact that the movie is recycling a well-used stereotype is what some people find objectionable-- poor black kid, only the white man can save him.
Also, the poster and the trailer are so cartoonish that I can barely stand too look at them-- they make me irritated for those good people, and the man that Oher became through hard work.
Dude, just read the book. As much as you like writing about football, you are really doing yourself a disservice by not reading the book. It's a football book first and foremost and that's something the movie is not going to get you.
Agreed. You'll kick yourself if you dont read that book at some point, man.
To back up AMT, I really loved this book. There's some great football tidbits all over the book - it's basically interweaving the odd tale of Oher's climb to Ole Miss, the saga of the West Coast offense, and the evolution of line play in football.
Personally, the trailers keep striking me as having really dumbed down the book, and elevated the mother's role way beyond what the book actually portrayed it as.
Anyway, you should get the book. It's good.
Just read the excerpt, and my first reaction is that I am very, very glad that somebody helped this kid. What makes the story unusual, in my mind, was that it was conservative white southerners who did it. That's the unexpected thing.
If it were anybody rescuing a kid in their own culture, or even white liberals with a strong social justice orientation rescuing a black kid, it would be a fairly standard story. Important for all concerned, but not new to audiences. But make it conservative white southerners, with roots in segregationist families no less, and it's a different matter.
That doesn't mean the movie will be executed well. Too many things can go wrong in any creative project. But the story itself is fascinating.
Is it truly rare for conservative white southerners, especially Christians, to go out of their way to do something extremely charitable like this? Or do you only assume that it is because you find their politics odious? I suspect (similarly without proof, I admit) that it is more common than you imagine, especially among true-believing Christians, although I can see why you'd think it would be rare for those raised in white segregationist families to lend a real helping hand to black people.
It's rare for Hollywood to get hold of the story. I do think white southerners as group get a lot of bad press, and that for some people every one of them will always be the screaming lunatics protesting school integration. And there are still some screaming lunatics around... there are reasons for the bad press.
Not all white southerners fit that negative stereotype, though, and it's challenging that stereotype that I find interesting.
(I'm a northerner transplanted to the south and trying to evaluate some of my own stereotypes about the region, if that makes my comment clearer.)
ohh, ok. gotcha. you were surprised that the press wrote a story about it.
Not just news-type press, but the whole phenomenon of book/movie/news debate. It's not really news when Hollywood liberals adopt a whole crowd of children of all different colors and backgrounds. Happens all the time. There's often a "rescue" component there too, regardless of race. (At the end of the Cold War, there was the whole "Romanian baby" thing that was sent up so delightfully on Absolutely Fabulous.)
But I suspect that the sort of people who find all that unremarkable in their own circles would be surprised to find it among people who they look down on as unenlightened rednecks. A family that made its money off fast food franchises, no less.
It's not the Christian component I'm keying in on so much, because I'm old enough to have childhood memories of hippie Christians adopting a lot of different kids. It's the white southern, working class origins component.
It is not rare at all for conservative white southerners to do extremely charitable actions. My husband's family is made up of conservative white southerners, and they have fostered more than a hundred kids, and succeeded in adopting five of them. They are some of the most charitable people I know.
we disagree vehemently about most things political and on almost all social issues. But even though I think I am the more accepting person (quite liberal on social issues), I've never spent one minute helping anyone outside of my immediate family and friends.
Guess who will be whisked in through the gates of heaven first? Probably not me.
I think that's one of the things that makes the story interesting, too. It's not just the white family/black kid angle, it's learning about a family that would take on this kind of responsibility as a charitable act. I have some relatives that have done something similar. Reading the article, the characters all seem like people I would like to know more about. I wouldn't see the movie, but the article was good, and I might buy the book after reading it. I can handle sentimentality in book form better than movie form.
Please read the book. It's absolutely great.
This thread is kind of disconcerting. A discussion of a movie that we haven't seen by a group of people who mostly haven't read the book. I realize there's a past here, but I think there's a much better discussion to be had if we can discuss the issues of imagery knowing what we can about the choices the filmmakers made. I can't really imagine a film that is faithful to the book that would escape the criticism of king kong, otherness, and historical cultural attachments that are being discussed here.
Agreed.
. I realize there's a past here, but I think there's a much better discussion to be had if we can discuss the issues of imagery knowing what we can about the choices the filmmakers made.
But that's not how people come to these posters and trailers. They come to them cold, and they react accordingly and have their own prejudices and attitudes challenged or affirmed accordingly. The poster has a disturbing undercurrent of 'white girl tames animal,' and you can't escape that by falling on the source material.
My wife and I saw the trailer for this...thing (and one for Precious) when we went to see Good Hair. I don't know anything about football, and I don't remember the movie being described as a true story, so I admit it: I laughed out loud in the theater, and the next day I wrote the following on Twitter: "Almost didn't get to see Good Hair yesterday. The 'Sandra Bullock Adopts A Black Kid & Learns Stuff' trailer made me want to blind myself."
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It's not fair to bring that kind of prejudice, or these kinds of expectations, to bear on The Blind Side. First and foremost, there is no one story, no one kind of narrative. Everyone doesn't find that kind of support in their community. Some people are, indeed, "saved" by white folks. (You could make an argument for me.) People have the right to tell those stories. I do think, to an extent, this is about how whites often encounter blacks--as individuals and not in the presence of their full community. More than that, I think it's about how I see the world, and the desire to see films that reflect that.
But like I said, it isn't right to put that sort of pressure on people who are just trying to tell a story. If I don't like it, I should go tell my own. Meh. I guess I have to go see the film, now.
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I know what you are saying. There is no single narrative, everyone has their story, but often times but not, the mainstream filters out stories that don't adhere to the prevailing notion and promotes the ones that do. For example, as an African, my story is one of growing up in the city (Nairobi), middle-class and having a life very similar to any middle-class/upper middle class kid in the West. Others grow up poor in rural areas, others grow up in war torn countries. I'm yet to see a story in mainstream Western media that mirrors mine, but I see tons of stories that mirror the 'poor starving uneducated african'. The problem is that when only one certain type of story is told, for minorities, that becomes THE story. It becomes the lens through which we are seen.
I saw the trailer for this movie when my wife and I went to watch 'Where the Wild Things are'. We both rolled our eyes in disbelief. I have no desire to see yet another 'whites save minority' story. It might be a story, but frankly, I've had it up to here with such stories.
On the whole idea of a single narrative pre-dominating, I can always recommend Chimananda Ngozi Adichie's TED Talk
Talks Chimamanda Adichie: The danger of a single story
http://www.ted.com/talks/chimamanda_adichie_the_danger_of_a_single_story.html
So I guess my anger is not at the story being told, it's at the fact that only a very narrow series of stories having to do with minorities ever get told in the mainstream. Any story that does not fit that narrow prism have a hard time making it to the mainstream. For example, I'd much rather see Danny Glover's Toussaint L'ouverture movie (it it ever gets made) than watch Amistad. While Amistad was a good movie, it too was about natives being 'saved'.
And the tragedy is that there are just so many great stories there. We need to see Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Sower, with its black female space-based cult leader in a future, post-collapse U.S. We need Charles Johnson’s epic Middle Passage. We need Thulani Davis’ Santeria influenced horror mystery, Maker of Saints. John Edgar Wideman’s Homewood trilogy. David Bradley’s The Chaneysville Incident. Paul Beatty’s White Boy Shuffle. Toni Cade Bambara’s Those Bones Are Not My Child. Chimamanda Adichie's Half a Yellow Sun. The stories are there, we just need filmmakers ready to take up the challenge.
Yes, Octavia Butler is long overdue for a cinematic rendering. Kindred is extraordinary. It's a modern classic, that sends a modern woman back in time for a complex and painful series of interactions with her white slave-owning ancestor. Her final novel, Fledgling, is a unique and raw vampire tale well apart from the latest craze. The Parables books, as well. Very necessary, indelible.
My husband and adult children are huge Butler fans. But Ms. Butler's books will likely only get made if Tyler Perry decides expand his universe. Failing that, a Peter Jackson could get them made, or a Josh Whedon.
Those filmmakers also need the funding.
I met Danny Glover upon first moving to NY in 1998 and he was hard at work (and had been for years) trying to get the Toussaint L'Overture / Haitian Revolution film made. A few years ago, it looked like it was gonna get made and there was brief buzz but alas, it still hasnt gotten made. He has scripts. He has actors committed to it. He has interest. He even has some pre-production going on.
But he doesnt have the kind of money it would take to make it, so...
I really loved Madison Smartt Bell's trilogy on the subject. I thought he wrote plausible 18th century Haitians. The first book is more focused on the liberal (in contemporary terms) French doctor, but the second and third are less so.
It's just a fascinating period of history and I thought Bell did in justice. Not for the faint of heart, though.
I love that talk. Your comment reminds me of How to Write About Africa, too.
I have a good friend who very much resented the poster for Eminem's 8 Mile because it showed Em writing rhymes on his hand. He didnt really resent the poster, he resented the system which reserved any serious respect for hip-hop as a literary form until a prodigious white rapper mastered it, at which point they all broke their ankles rishing to proclaim his poetic brilliance.
To Em's credit, he has early and often credited his inspirations--even guys as obscure to mainstream America as Masta Ace--too bad mainstream America wont follow his lead and respect the game as well as the player.
But then what else is new in American pop culture?
You cringe I cringe. Sandra tames the beast. We were recently treated to another interpretation of this visual with the Annie Leibovitz, LeBron/Giselle Vogue 2008 Cover and photo spread
"Sandra tames the beast. "
Um, wouldn't "Sandra turns him into a beast" be more apt?
Either way, how i wish the Art Dept. would have taken just a moment to explore a visual than that of Oher as "Exhibit A".
This is just a guess, but having worked for two of the biggest media companies in the world, its an informed guess: all the decision makers in that art department were White.
Buffy on the brain this morning... I just thought of a quote from the character Dawn: "It was ironic when all those cute inner-city kids taught their coach a valuable lesson." Or something to that effect. It's enough of a cliche that a very white program like Buffy could poke fun at it.
But it's not as though adopting kids from deprived backgrounds has stopped. (Kids from prosperous, intact families don't get put up for adoption much.) The stories do get told, from the perspectives of both the parents and the kids. As do stories of athletes battling adversity before achieving success. A lot of plots have an element of cliche.
It's all in how it's done, so I can't say much more without seeing the movie. Posters and trailers are just marketing material, and they may or may not give an accurate impression of the product.
" Posters and trailers are just marketing material, and they may or may not give an accurate impression of the product. "
See Funny People.
Just read the NYT piece, it was great, well worth reading. I had never heard this story. I get and share the exhaustion with white savior and magic Negro narratives in film. But lately, how many good films are there, period? The industry is lazy, churning out tired story line after super hero blockbuster, after sequel, and this kind of film is just an example of that. Drama relies on contrasts and the unexpected - both are in this story in a very easy way to see and sell, "easy" being the key word.
TNC, on Denzel, given the "math" you often refer to, a whole lot of white people have had to like Denzel in order for him to have been so popular all these years, so I was interested in your explanation of why he might be so popular. I've always thought it was because he was an excellent actor (duh) combined with being one of the most handsome men ever born, with an added touch of that something something that makes women swoon. Doesn't Chris Rock do a whole piece on women and Denzel?
Great actor and really handsome. In this day and age, one can be really popular in the black community and be really popular in the broader country. Look at Obama and Cosby. Will Smith is the most successful actor in the country. Yet him and his wife stay on the cover of Essence.
Will Smith is absolutely one of the most attractive men in the country, mostly because he seems so genuinely happy all the time, and very satisfied with who he is. Not that he pretends all is perfect-- he just doesn't bitch and whine and pout like so many other people. The same with Cosby and Obama. There's nothing I (and most people) like more than a real, genuine smile.
Denzel is very popular, among White and Black people, but there are an awful lot of Black women out here who would have loved to see him in more romantic leading man roles. That said, he starred in my favorite sports movie of all time: "Remember the Titans." Yes, I know its corny and likely more myth than fact, but I loved seeing so many fine Black actors on the screen. Best line: "I don't scratch my head unless it itches and I don't dance unless i hear music." (Second favorite: "Somebody Up There Likes Me.")
Romantic roles, yes. I thought "Pelican Brief" in particular was ridiculous, when he and Julia Roberts did not get it on.
I got through as many of these comments as I could - my suggestion to all of you who think you have something to contribute to this post is to read the book. It will prepare you more that the author of this post.
So, at its core, this post is written by someone criticizing a movie trailer based off a book he's never read, though he did read an excerpt in the NY Times!! And you get paid for this???
Read the comment I left for elhondo. Media doesn't exist in a vaccum.
Totally insufficient analysis Persia - when the very thoughts in this comments page seem to exist in a vaccum.
I love how people have selective memory too. What about Remember the Titans? I guess that was typical Hollywood prejudice b***sh*t too? Oh wait...Denzel was in it. TNC is cool with it then.
Seriously, dude. Anyone whose ever studied criticism will tell you that it's valid to look at texts separately and/or together as long as the text being examined is clear. Just to help you out, in critical terms, anything can be treated as a "text" not just words. A commemorative plate can be a text that tells us about say, attitudes surrounding Queen Elizabeth's ascension. The object could be taken on it's own or in a context of its time in Britain or compared to other representations of sovereigns. If you have a blog, you could start a discussion of the book.
I have no love for Remember the Titans, by the way. Black people don't just sing Motown together unless we're in a chorus or at a karaoke bar, thanks.
Also, the existence of one black football team movie doesn't negate all the other white savior sports movies.
I don't understand why you visit the "vaccum" you seem to dislike so much. Btw, up thread I noted that "Remember the Titans" was my favorite sports movie but based on your comments I don't think we liked it for the same reasons. Having, as I also noted up thread, worked for two of the largest media companies in the world, I can tell you, Persia's analysis is spot on.
a) The title of the blog post makes it clear that this is based on a visceral reaction to the trailer and/or poster, not a meditation on the book. The trailer and poster aren't for the book. But you don't want anyone to comment on the poster until they've read the book? Can they comment on a poster for Shakespeare in Love without first reading the entire Shakespeare cannon?
b) The poster has a very strong King Kong, small white woman tames huge savage dark beast, look. The movie could defy every expectation raised by the poster and trailer and still, the poster (King Kong) and trailer (Sandra Bullock saves a black kid) could legitimately turn people off. Complaining that something is being horribly marketed is not new and does not rely on the artistic value of the original source material of the thing being marketed. Sometimes Shakespeare spinoff movies, or their trailers, suck.
And one more thing for the "totally informed" and "utterly unpredjudiced" writer of this blog...
If you had actually spent the time to read the book (takes a few days, it's not very long) before you wrote a post titled A Totally Uninformed, Utterly Prejudiced Notion about how you recoiled from the movie poster, you would probably understand why a) many people were attracted to the story and b) why Holywood is: because it's as much about how a mammoth, illiterate black teen-aged boy whose only redeeming quality seems to be how completely screweed up his life is saves a rich, popular, christian white family (from Mississippi no less) from their prejudices.
Read before you write please.
Have you seen the movie?
Also, wasn't TNC making fun of himself by calling it 'A Totally Uninformed, Utterly Prejudiced Notion?'
The fact that someone would write a blog post talking about how he's prejudiced for identifying the prejudice of a story is exactly what I am criticizing, since the book itslef is TOO GOOD to be given that kind of dismissive analysis by someone who is clearly too lazy to read up on a topic he feels fully qualified to write on.
He obviously didn't feel fully qualified because he admitted as such.
"If I don't like it, I should go tell my own. Meh. I guess I have to go see the film, now."
"It's not fair to bring that kind of prejudice, or these kinds of expectations, to bear on The Blind Side."
If these aren't disclaimers, I'm not sure what are.
I think you're getting stuck on the book versus the movie. Coates criticized the movie that the trailer appears to be selling.
You must know that movies very often fuck all to do with the books they're based on, right? And I don't have a problem with that, because books and movies are different things. I haven't seen "Watchmen" because it's a perfect superhero comic, but that doesn't make me want to see the same story done as a movie. Sometimes what's good about a book and a movies are the same, sometimes they're totally different.
"Read the book" is not a response to a complaint about what the movie looks like based on the trailer.
Do you really think Hollywood wouldn't take the interesting story you're describing and turn it into "Dangerous Minds" with football and slapping Lewis' title, which they've payed for, on the results?
Sorry matt i had the same reaction as TNC about both the trailer and the poster. I thought the movie looked horrible, and the poster was absolutely cartoonish. Just because you like the book doesn't mean everyone else can't have an opinion too.
This post is not about the book. It's about an image on a poster, and how that makes TNC feel about representations of race in movies. It's okay to disagree with that, but I think you are getting off-base with your comments.
For that matter, movie adaptations rarely resemble the books they're based on, even when they're taken from a true story.
Wow your big loud pouting tantrum in this thread is a little disappointing. I think if you had decided so quickly to condemn everyone here as know-nothings with uninformed opinions who are rushing to drop race cards, you might actually learn something yourself. That is to say, you who is blasting others for being closed-minded, remove the mote from thine own eye.
Yeesh. The blog post is not about the book. It is about the movie poster. The two are different. This sounds like an interesting story that I might buy for the sports fans in my family, but that is not a redeeming quality that will raise all marketing materials for a movie based on the book above any crass criticism.
Kinda a side note, this trailer makes me see why Moneyball never went into production
One of the larger themes of the book is that the twin advents of LT/Parcells rush defense and NFL free agency created a lucrative market for a certain type of athlete (agile, 300+-pound men), and once that market was established, all of the ponderous infrastructure that focuses on sourcing pro talent turned to finding and developing the Orlando Paces and Jonathan Ogdens of the world. Without LT and NFL free agency, the Michael Oher story probably doesn't happen, at least not in the same way.
And when that point is in your face, it makes you feel uncomfortable, because you realize that there are still thousands of Michael Ohers in our country-- including the real Oher's siblings-- who won't find a spot on a private high school football team, or a family of wealthy Ole Miss boosters willing to adopt them. While the smaller story of Oher's personal struggle is extremely moving and powerful, to me the bigger picture context was the most valuable part of Michael Lewis's book. Everything I've read about the movie suggests that this macro-level story is gone, which is why I probably won't get around to watching it.
As for the racial argument about what kinds of movies get made in Hollywood-- basically at this point you've got your Hoosiers/Rocky axis (white athlete, white support figure), your Remember the Titans/Coach Carter axis (black athletes/some whites, black support figure), your Glory Road/White Shadow axis (black athletes, white support figure), and your ever-powerful Legend of Bagger Vance axis (white athlete, black support figure). Now one of those axes sticks out just a little bit in terms of the type of support/guidance offered to the athlete, so I think there are still some fair criticisms to be made about the role of race in sports movies.
But I think we can all agree, racially speaking, that there are not enough Jim Thorpe-axis movies being made in Hollywood today. Personally I am ready for the Carlisle Indian Industrial School vs Harvard U finale scene.
WIN.
But hey, Wildcats with Goldie Hawn was great, right?
I have looked at it a few times and I am still completely dumbfounded by Matt C's reference to Above The Rim. Are you referencing that as a serious example of Hollywood showing black people "saving" other black people? Was it Leon and Duane Martin winning the tournament at the end? It's like saying, Hollywood has plenty of movies about Latina women "saving" Latina women. Haven't you seen Chasing Papi.
I thought the exact same thing when I saw that.
Seriously, Above The Rim? At least we could have referenced Coach Carter.
Well...I don't have a desire to see this, because it looks like your typical maudlin Hollywood syrup-pic and I don't like those, no matter what the subject matter.
Howevah, I might go home and watch The Program. Or maybe The Pelican Brief.
And, if I can convince my mom to go with me during her visit this weekend, we'll go to the last TCW game of the year. Remember those Titans, everyone! (Another good story made into a movie I didn't care for...but it is my neighborhood school.)
I saw the trailer for this film too, right before "where the wild things are" was shown. I had a very similar reaction: "i am NOT gonna see this film, I am so sick of these types of stories being made by Hollywood." The "white man's burden" or in thise case "white woman's burden" type of movie, is what I mean.
i also felt myself strangely torn, because I know it was based on a true story. he really was tremendously helped by this white family. People have a right to tell their stories or whatever. That being said, I couldn't help but feel that there are too many stories like this being told by Hollywood that fits into this tired narrative: white person saving a non-white person.
So in essence, it's great the book came out, and there are excerpts to be read. I have no problem with that and obviously anybody can tell their story anyway they want to. I just question the greenlighting of this movie, while so many others that don't fit into a sterotypical white/black relationship or narrative, aren't greenlighted. It does bother me, I have no desire to see another film like this.
Pardon if this has already been said:
Can think of two movies off top of my head where Morgan Freeman - and the director - were apparently color-blind: Unforgiven and Shawshank.
Struck by that then and now. No stereotype, no color; just a person.
Walked out of Unforgiven, after the credits rolled and my wife and I read each and every. Third thing out of my mouth was "Fascinated there was absolutely zero reference to Freeman's character's color. None. Not one obvious or nuanced reference - at all. Didn't matter in the least."
As a side note, I find it dryly comic that just about every other character in that story is a cartoon in contrast to Freeman's. His is the only nuanced part although English Bob almost steals the movie out from under everybody.
Am sure there are more movies that do not lean heavily on the character's inclusion as function of color. Those are two that occur. I look for it and try to get past the cartoons to some larger point.
It's getting more challenging...
It's easy to either vote with your wallet or work with your head. First one is easy - even easier if it's not in your budget; second one is a little more difficult.
In my experience, TNC is fair correct: cocaine was largely a white drug, making a large group of fools throughout the eighties. Saw this in two different markets, Ohio and Minnesota.
"I didn't know."
right.
PS/ Hi folks - I'm new.
Actually a fair number of Denzel's pix don't focus on his charecter's race: "Inside Man," "The Bone Collector," "Man on Fire."
Yep, and I'd bet that's another reason why he has so much respect among Black moviegoers--cause sometimes he reps for us hard, and sometimes his race is completely beside the point, and both situations are positive influences on Af. Am cultural representation, which seems to echo the Hippocratic Oath in its demand: "First, Do No Harm."
I think Denzel Washington is one of the most popular black men in America because a) women think he's handsome and b) he's a great actor. I don't know where his ties to black people in his roles come into play.