Tuesday, February 07, 2017

Just Thinking Out Loud

Not to make too fine a point of it, or raise the black movie issue again, but have you noticed;

1) Yes, there are some excellent movies with strong casts of African-Americans in all kinds of roles.

  • Moonlight- black writers and director, powerful coming-of-age story in a whole new way. Great Oscar buzz for a while.
  • Fences- a marvelous adaptation of African-American playwright August Wilson's play. Mesmerizing to watch.
  • Hidden Figures- a true story of three African-American women who truly did get Americans into space through their mathematical skills. Made me want to make sure we don't lose the gains we have made.
2) Yes, there is also another excellent movie, Lion starring Dev Patel, a British actor of Indian heritage, a person of color. The most moving and epic of these four. My pick for Best Picture!

3) Yes, there are all kinds of nominations for people of color and these movies. Any one of which is highly qualified for Best Picture, Best Acting, Best Direction, etc. This is not in reaction to the previous years missing many good performances. All these movies have been in production long before that and are truly great movies on their own and should stand up to any of the excellent movies, past or present.

But here is where I am cautious, yet just thinking out loud....
With all these utterly amazing movies and cast, the movie that seems to be taking the world by storm is an admittedly top-notch musical about Los Angeles, a white jazz musician, and an update of the "golden era" movie musicals, called La La Land.

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