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photo courtesy of mrpatok

Last week I decided to take a break from the grind of pursuing freelance work to go see Soul Men with Bernie Mac and Samuel L. Jackson. It was really surreal to watch a new movie where two of the actors had recently passed away.  I mentioned in previous posts how difficult it is to put aside the analysis cap as a writer when going to the movies. I really wanted to watch this movie from an entertainment standpoint because my mind needed the break.

Here’s what I was able to enjoy before the critic stepped in:

·        I loved the grit of Samuel L.’s character, Louis Hinds. I’m a big fan of sarcasm anyway.

·        Bernie Mac’s character, Floyd Henderson talked a big game and as the movie progressed he began to back it up with action.

·        It was great to see Sean Hayes from Will & Grace, he was funny as a TV exec and didn’t seem type-cast at all. I saw him as the actor who played Jack McFarland from Will & Grace instead of seeing as Jack McFarland.

·        Jennifer Coolidge was hysterical. She’s played a variety of roles, one of which includes the salon owner in one of the Legally Blond movies.

·        One surprise was Cleo, played by Sharon Leal. I won’t give her character away in the film other than to say she’s more than a back-up and her voice was something truly not to be missed.

I had forgotten how much swearing goes on in some Black movies. I know for those opposed to it, they find little need for it but it was highly necessary in this instance and lent to the humor.

It reminded me of the weekend family parties that would just materialize. It would start with Grandma’s cooking and Grandpa playing cards on the porch. Before you knew it there’d be four to six men on the porch and just as many women in the kitchen with kids running in and out. There’d be the strong whiff of fried chicken in the air along with lots of trash talking. When the lightening bugs came out and the kids could no longer play ball in the street the party would move inside till late in the evening.

Soul Men was very entertaining. I’m glad I held the critic at bay long enough to laugh and revisit the times of my youth visiting Grandma’s house.  

Much like the books we read, the movies we watch also carry themes. While some creative forms are designed just to amuse, I truly enjoy those that enlighten and inform as they entertain. I suppose a movie or a book has to have some kind of purpose not just for the reader but for the characters involved as well. I want to know that when the movie is over or I’ve closed the book, that the characters have learned from their mistakes or made peace with their demons. I want to witness some sort of transformation or evolution.

Amidst the humor, the songs and the fancy costumes, Soul Men does deliver a message of dreams resurrected, forgiveness and facing consequences. I enjoyed watching Floyd Henderson, Bernie Mac’s character, fight to remain relevant in a society that likes to put retired folks and the elderly out to pasture, while Louis Hinds, Samuel L. Jackson’s character, just fights to survive with his former glory appearing as nothing more than a footnote to his present life. They come together in an effort to meet all these needs and find courage and forgiveness along the way.

Soul Men meant much more than I thought it would and I enjoyed it far better as a result.

As a writer, the way I watch movies will never be the same. After finding out that Lakeview Terrace, the latest Samuel L. Jackson flick produced by Will Smith’s production company Overbrook Entertainment, had interracial themes, I decided to go see it for blog material’s sake.

             The movie had caught my interest anyway, I mean, who can play a menacing socio-path better than Samuel L. Jackson? But I had not decided to go see it until I learned of its interracial themes since movies that have multicultural or interracial themes are of especial interest to me.

             Maybe that’s why I found myself watching this movie like a writer. I wasn’t taking notes in the theatre or anything like that, (Although I did jot a few thoughts down on the back of my ticket stub as the opening credits began to roll.) but I immediately noticed how extreme everything is. Filmmakers, in the hope that we don’t miss the point, often exaggerate events, dialogue and human response in order to elicit the viewer reaction they are looking to generate.

             I don’t know if I’ve had my face in a book too often lately, but Lakeview Terrace definitely assaulted my senses, just when I thought I was becoming desensitized to movie violence and psychological bullying.

             Don’t get me wrong, it was a good movie and I found myself punching the air when the good guy one-ups the bad guy with logic instead of brawn during the movie’s highest climax. That’s the thing about suspenseful types of movies and what we can learn when increasing tension in our novels. There should be multiple levels of conflict. This movie definitely had that. There was internal conflict, man vs. nature, the emotional conflict between the man and his wife, as well psychological conflict between the man and his neighbor.

             Samuel L., as Abel Turner, stopped at nothing to terrorize this couple, and just when you think you can’t take it anymore the movie resolves itself and its time to leave the theatre.

             This movie had an interesting twist in that you really see the unraveling of the villain. There are instances where you are a party to Abel’s emotional demise and the couple, the target of his rage are not in the scene and are not the cause of that current conflict.

             I learned valuable lessons in watching this movie not just about race and interpersonal relationships but about how to manipulate the reaction of your audience. The test of our abilities as writers has a lot to do with our ability to elicit the appropriate response we are trying to convey in our writing during a given moment.

             I wondered before the movie began just how a movie about racial intolerance toward a mixed race couple was going to hold my interest for nearly two hours. Well, it was the layering of the different types of conflict as well as the actions that lead to the resolution that kept my eyes on the screen. (OK, I had to look away once and it wasn’t because of what was happening on the screen but what I was afraid would happen next as a result of the current action taking place. I tend to do that in books, movies and life, I instinctively anticipate what’s coming. Sometimes I’m right, sometimes, I’m not. I’m glad I wasn’t right in this instance or the outcome may have been too tragic to tolerate.)

             Next time you go to a movie, see if your responses are appropriate for what’s currently happening on screen. Identify what levels of conflict are being used to increase tension and interest. When you do, it makes movies more entertaining and complex which may nicely transition to your writing.

courtesy mycine

As I mentioned before, it was a Jet magazine article about Kerry Washington that lead me to see Lakeview Terrace, her new movie starring Samuel L. Jackson and produced by Will Smith’s production company, Overbrook Entertainment Management.

             In short the movie is about a young interracial couple who is terrorized by Abel Turner, a black veteran police officer played by Samuel L. Jackson who does not approve of his neighbors’ interracial marriage.

             More than just a movie about interracial relationships and racial intolerance, this movie hit home for me on many levels. I loved the idea that we were witnessing the white male’s point of view. We always seem to focus on the disapproving white family or white society when dealing with interracial couples or the passive aggressive feelings exhibited by the African American families associated with the interracial romance.

             While we finally get to see that side I found it a little annoying that in this movie and in Something New, when the white male expresses exhaustion at the constant reminder and discussion of race, his African American partner can’t empathize with him, because her life has always been about race. While I understand the implication that finally this white person is getting a taste of what we put up with everyday of our lives, I don’t think it is wrong for him to find it difficult or hard to endure. After all, if we as African Americans didn’t have to deal with it, would we? He doesn’t have to, but chooses to because of his love for this woman of color. If you can’t express those moments of anxiety and emotional exhaustion to your significant other who happens to live it every day as well, then who can he turn to?

             There were a couple of other themes that ran through this movie that I had experienced in my own interracial relationships and it caught me off guard to see them depicted here.

             First, undoubtedly, I have been African American all my life, and while I’ve had many non-blacks say they don’t see me as a black person just a person or just me, it is not as reassuring or comforting to hear as they might have hoped. While being black is not all that I am, it is an important quality of who I am. I say quality because I appreciate and cherish it. So, I want people to see my beautiful toffee skin, my full lips and my penetrating coal-like eyes.

             In this movie, all those things that should be celebrated were now for naught, because Kerry Washington’s character, Lisa had bonded herself in marriage to a white man. Even in Abel’s rage over the white man “getting everything and anything he wants including our women” Abel degrades her as he lusts for her.

             In the opening scenes, when Kerry’s character, Lisa is doing the walk-through of the house with her father, Abel was more comfortable seeing a potentially older black man receive the flirtatious affections of a woman young enough to be his daughter than see that young black girl with a white man her own age.

             In playing a strict disciplinarian to his teenage children, it was perfectly ok to drop trou in front of Lisa to demonstrate to his daughter that parading around in a bathing suit despite being poolside in a backyard was inappropriate.

             Also noteworthy, is a brief scene between Chris and his friend at the couple’s housewarming party. The friend, who is a white male, tells Chris that he’s hit the jackpot in marrying Lisa and that he’s hoping to land a black girl of his own one day. For now, however, he’s getting a taste of the Pacific Rim. It’s that notion that men regardless of race are perfectly free to taste all the female flavors, but as far as the women who share their race, they better know to whom they belong. This is something that is brought up again in conversation between Abel’s daughter and Lisa in case the audience missed it the first time.  

Other themes that hit home were the contrast between Lisa’s husband and the minority men in the film. On more than one occasion Chris’ suitability to protect his family came up in the film. First, his father-in-law asked directly how he planned to protect Lisa and his future grandchildren, and later, Chris isn’t even given the chance to protect Lisa from an intruder because Abel dashes in with his gun drawn to “take care” of the attacker.

             In my own relationships, that often came up as well. There are alpha and beta men in every race. No matter the melanin levels, some men are protector types and some are not. I didn’t date the men I dated because I wanted a protector and yes, I didn’t feel especially “safe” around them; at least no safer than when I was with anyone else. Maybe that’s one of the reasons those relationships didn’t last. While women don’t always look to be protected, maybe the men in their lives have to feel trusted that they could protect them if the need should arise?

             And yes, if you’re wondering, I was a daddy’s girl and always felt safe with him nearby. Unfortunately he is only near me in spirit now.

             I really went into this movie not expecting to find anything more than a new twist on racial intolerance, but I came out with reassurance that my own interracial experiences were not unusual or isolated. They were a part of bigger social and generational interrelationships that are further complicated by gender and race.

 Well it happened again with Oakbrook Entertainment’s Lakeview Terrace. While I think you can’t get much better than Samuel L Jackson for a lunatic socio-path cop, the only glimpses of this movie I caught were his menacing glances and creepy laughter. Until I read an article on Kerry Washington an African American actor and co-star in the film, I would have never known the target of Samuel’s obsessive rage was an interracial couple who had moved in next door. Some of the publicity this movie has been getting expresses the conflict as being Samuel’s disapproval of a neighbor’s interracial relationship, but some of my research revealed that earlier on what the Jackson’s character finds objectionable is the new neighbor’s lifestyle.

             Well, lifestyle could mean anything. I never really viewed my interest in white men as a lifestyle choice. You tend to be attracted to who or what culture you know, but then again, as the cliché goes, “Opposites Attract.”

             One particular poignant moment in the film is when the neighbor Chris Mattson played by Patrick Wilson comes home after work blaring rap music. He’s catching a quick smoke in his car before heading into the house because his wife doesn’t approve of his smoking when Samuel’s character Abe Turner taps on the window pretending to be a carjacker. Abe introduces himself after scaring the life out of his new neighbor only to give him the third degree about his educational background and how he came to be married to an African American woman. His demeanor starts out as inquisitive but quickly becomes passive aggressive and judgmental. Doubting that the man could have anything in common with black people and even more skeptical when Chris tells him he is the one who likes rap while his black wife does not, Abe’s parting words are, “You can blast that noise all you want, but you’re still a white guy.”

             The whole crux of this movie is the quick and aggressive unraveling of Samuel’s psych and the danger of his prejudices projected on this mixed couple. As the movie climaxes and begins to reach a resolve, you learn that it is more than this particular couple that’s got his goat but what this couple represents.

             It’s a good movie; I just found the timing and the subtle reference to its interracial themes very interesting. Now that the movie is out Oakbrook must be far less subtle regarding its themes and I’m glad, because intolerance doesn’t have a white face or a black face, it resides to some degree or another in all of us.