I want to see something “normal” being promoted on a large scale. It always baffled me that there are so few non-minstrel-esque nice romantic comedies or a drama that is not melodramatic and contrived. But I do realize that “we” (many black women) will not go support films that are uplifting or intelligent, it saddens me, they don’t know what they are missing. Sigh…

The beginning of your post here is what I can’t get over when people write about this movie as an uplifting and empowering story. People are heaping praise on a movie where the main character is abused by her mother and raped by her father. I can’t get over that.

SAL wrote:

I have very mixed feelings about this film–and the book. I remember seeing Sapphire at a predominately white Ivy League university in the 1990s. It was so nice to see another black face (she was there for a reading). I said hello to her–we were in an empty hallway–and she deliberately walked past me without saying a word. A very intentional snub. I was in my mid-20s, she was older, and I couldn’t help but think it was because I was young, fair skinned, and had the appearance of being upper middle class (far from it). I can see why she would write such a book–lots of self-hatred and baggage rattling ’round that brain. I think we Americans love train wrecks, especially when they involve minorities and the poor. Precious looks OTT–yes, I’m sure I’d cry with the best in them as it touches on a lot of things black women and women face, even if on a micro level. But there’s something very, very ugly about the film, particularly at this moment in American history. It is as if we’re saying this is what it means to be black and poor, and there’s no escape. There’s no escape because the society at large doesn’t clamor for it. It has become comfortable with a populace that has lived in abject urban poverty for decades now, as if this populace sprang from the rat-infested earth it inhabits. That is plain wrong. Also, despite its ridiculous moments, White’s review is worth a read. I know we women like to agree on everything, but we shouldn’t stand behind a film, especially one directed by the guy who directed Monster’s Ball, just because it’s a story about an obese, raped, dark-skinned black girl growing up in abject poverty. We’re smarter than that.

Posted 07 Nov 2009 at 12:53 pm

I originally found the review from The Black Snob, and she mentioned that even a stopped clock is right twice a day: I think it’s probably an apt description.

I didn’t see any of the other movies he mentioned, so I can’t comment on his reviews about them. But his specific statements about Precious reflect my problems with that genre of creative works, and how poverty and abuse are portrayed, so I mentioned him here — I didn’t mean it as a whole-cloth approval of his skill as a reviewer overall.

Don’t think I’ll be watching that movie either. I rarely go to the movies and when I do I go to see something I’d really want to see. The last time I went to the movies was to see (500) Days of Summer. I’m not one of those people who blindly supports something because Black people were involved in it.

Also, I did the film (advanced screening and it was free) and a few of your points were dead on.

I plan to return and read more of your commentary. You got skills.

Steven

And, I absolutely HATE, yeah, HATE so-called street lit. It disgusts me to walk into a bookstore and see a whole front section with asses, breast, and legs all glossy and stuff…while everything else black is behind it. Street lit is not real literature…it’s not…okay, IMHO.

(Hey Miki!)