about 2012 films: I see black people

At the Oscars, Daniel Day-Lewis won Best Actor.

Both the films "Lincoln" and "Django Unchained" concern African American slavery in the US--an issue that in ways big and small plagues the US still. But "Lincoln" portrays and conveys black people differently--I think with a greater truth, the kind of truth only realized in art.

How so?

"Lincoln" doesn't have any main black characters. It has hardly any black people at all. Sure, it's about that President at a specific moment, and not about slaves. But what and who is Lincoln? Why do we honor him today? States' rights were at stake, but the civil war was fought over slavery, and that is Lincoln's legacy.

All during the film, black people are peripheral, somewhere on the edges, rarely seen, rarely on screen. And aside from gentle scenes of dialog at the beginning and end of the film, they are never confronted. Their captivity and freedom is debated with a little input from those most affected.

But though they are invisible, black Americans are everywhere in the themes and culture and gravity of the moments being enacted. They are the thing referred to but never spoken of; they are exchangeed but never valued. They are marginalized in the film, reflecting their existence in America, and the racially collective experience of their existence here for some time.


Notes:
* The only other film I saw is "Flight".


(Also, the President now is black.)

Hulking mess

Not long ago I found myself thinking about  the Incredible Hulk movies. I much prefer the Ang Lee version of Hulk starring Eric Bana. Besides getting to enjoy the delicacy and subtlety that comes with Lee, his version gives more food for thought because Banner's demons dwell within and Lee puts them in focus. He explores Banner's feelings about his father, his resentment and anger, his loneliness, and his own confused identity.  But in the second version, The Incredible Hulk directed by Louis Leterrier and starring awesome Edward Norton, the focus is mostly on Banner's external enemies. His fiercest battle is with the renegade demon hulk--Tim Roth's character--and their conflict so clearly demarcates good and evil that it diminishes the overall depth of the subject. Even Banner's own anger issue is externalized in the form of the pulse monitor he wears on his wrist--this annoying, beeping measuring stick he vigilantly watches.

In addition to being more visually poetic and richer in substance, Lee's version has few if any clumsy parts. His use of story board frames plays well with the film's comic book origins. Contrast this with the wild leaps in the second version; for example, how about the scene in which Hulk fights the army on the college campus?: The helicopter crashes, debris flies, and quite suddenly the bright, sunny afternoon becomes a dark and stormy night, rain pouring down on the wreckage and the Hulk as he cradles Betty Ross. And the plot? To deal with the Hulk, the army attempts to make another one? Experimentally? Nah.