Sunday, January 22, 2012

To Red Tail or Not to Red Tail, that is the question...

There has been a lot of push back concerning the "hysteria" of Black people  who feel we HAVE to see the George Lucas film because he spent $58 million of his own money and hollywood won't make Black films again, ever, if we don't go see this.  Now, I believe that we should support this movie because it focuses on our history and african-american contributions are not often lauded in the public sphere. HOWEVER, as these two articles put it, they ain't buying it. Bomani Jones puts it this way:

What, you think the reason Hollywood doesn’t make big budget movies about black people is because…black people won’t watch them? You really think, if every black person in America goes and sees “Red Tails,” there’s going to be a long line of big-budget black movies hitting theaters near you? What, black people are the reason the studios don’t think these films will make international bank? They drawing that many folks to the box office in Africa?
Noooooo, the reason movies like these can’t get made is, clearly, studios don’t think white people will go see serious depiction of the African-American experience (or, put in a way less likely to offend, “can’t market it”). I’d gander that’s also the same reason that television shows with predominantly black casts are dinosauric on television now. Hell, I’ve never heard a person who truly watched the wire say something less than laudatory, but it couldn’t get a ratings foothold in any of its five years with its brilliant, predominantly black cast.

Many are mad, if you check the comments section after these article, because black woman aren't depicted.  Another salient point is that George Lucas brought us the lovely and talented computer animated character who only needs a razor to make the coon-like picture complete: Jar Jar Binks.  So what does he know about creating solid black characters that are not stereotypes.


Long gone are the days that we should have to feel a need to prove anything to Hollywood.  If anything, it is the reverse.  And if Hollywood is as racist as we all know it is why should we feel the need to let the decision of what images gets green-lighted continue to be placed in the hands of those, who don’t see us as human beings? I mean, the last time Hollywood took interest in the black market we got a bunch of one-dimensional Blaxiploitation and gangster flicks in both the 70s and in the 90s.
Instead let’s throw our support – and dollars – behind filmmakers, who continue to make conscious efforts to not only make films despite not having the blessings of mainstream Hollywood but make good films period.

So if we don't goto this movie, there will be others because frankly, the iPhone exists and you can make a damn good movie on that thing; and I don't even need a degree from the NYU film school...

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