JSU*Toi
New Member
This should be on Round Table but it will get more views and replies here... Someone sent this to me. Its definitely something to think about. It long but if u have some time people, its worth some thought.
I Take No Pride In Halle Berry's Oscar Nomination
By Miles Willis
As an African-American man, I find nothing to be proud of in actress Halle Berry's recent Academy Award nomination. I haven't even seen the film, so it's not that I don't think her performance deserves to be so recognized. Nor is the significance of her nomination, and its potential for opening up more doors and attitudes for black actresses, lost upon me. I simply find
the premise of "Monster's Ball," in which a character played by one of our most prized beauties, falls in love with a racist white prison guard, (played by an actor named Billy Bob no less,) who led her late husband to his execution, is deliberately insulting. With its profanely incongruous and utterly implausible scenario, the plot of this film is a sneering, in-your-face taunt to all black men.
Imagine the seething indignation that a Jewish man might feel while watching a story in which the widow of a Nazi concentration camp victim has an intimate relationship with the SS officer that shoved her husband into one of those ovens at Auschwitz!
And for Ms. Berry, "Monster's Ball" is unfortunately just the latest
screening, at least since 1992's "Boomerang," in which we must endure seeing her in the throes of passion with white men. Her character boldly exposed her breasts to a white man in the movie "Swordfish," another 'got down' with an old white senator in "Bullworth," and had two white men, husband and lover/co-conspirator, in playing "The Rich Man's Wife."
Of course portraying Dorothy Dandridge required Berry's character, as Dandridge once described her own romantic/marital relationships, to 'throw (herself) at white men.' It seems that that's all Hollywood will throw at Ms. Berry. I don't think that it's mere coincidence. The motivation behind this phenomenon is clearly rooted in the legacy of slavery. Many plantation owners were notorious sexual predators who forced themselves upon slave women and girls of their choice at their leisure, and
their men were powerless to stop it.
On today's plantation, Hollywood confirms that 'old times there (truly) are not forgotten' as they recreate those longed-for days of unrestricted dalliances with their chattel by casting the best looking black actresses with white actors. At the same time they marginalize black men, both in front of and behind the camera, into cinematic inferiority and insignificance, denying them access to the opportunity to tell passionate tales of black people in love. Except for the all-black film adaptations of "Carmen" and "Porgy and Bess," the latter having been referred to by some black actors as a 'c**n show,' Dandridge, always near the top of any list of all-time most beautiful African-American women, never had an on-screen black lover, or an off-screen one for that matter, since only white men could advance her career. Lena Horne never played opposite white actors, but felt compelled to marry a white man just so that she could more fully enjoy the accoutrements of her show business celebrity.
Fast forward to 1992, with Whitney Houston who starred in the movie, "The Bodyguard." As one of the most successful pop singers in history, with cover-girl looks and proven crossover appeal, she could have made a romantic drama with Denzel, Wesley, Morris, etc., that would surely have been a box office smash. Instead, Hollywood produced a big budget, heavily promoted blockbuster in which Whitney's character takes a white man as her protector and lover. I felt snubbed and disrespected, having to just stand by and let 'Massa' take my woman for himself, just like before.
Now, let's flip the scenario, as we consider the country music vocalist Leann Rimes. She is a beautiful, successful recording artist, who surely will act in movies someday. But can you imagine her first role being analogous to Whitney's, that of a singer with a black bodyguard/lover? It's inconceivable! Why? I think it's because the media has so successfully demonized black men that the movie industry would run the risk of offending white male viewers with such a pairing.
But, they obviously have no such concerns about our sensibilities. Angela Bassett, a critically acclaimed and enchantingly beautiful actress, was Robert DeNiro's character's girlfriend in "The Score." Thandie Newton's character in the second "Mission Impossible" movie was shared between two white characters. Not to mention playing Sally Hemming to Nick Nolte's Thomas Jefferson. Even the original super-sister Pam Grier had a white lover in "Foxy Brown." And falling for a white bail bondsman who helped set up the murder of a black man, Samuel Jackson, in "Jackie Brown."
The main purpose of the movie industry is to create fantasy. And, it's pretty obvious whose fantasies Hollywood is trying to satisfy. I want to go to big-budget, action-packed, exciting, romantic, heavily promoted and critically acclaimed movies and see beautiful black women with guys who look, at least somewhat, like me. So that I can fantasize about them being with me, just like the white men do when they go see movies with beautiful
white women like Sandra Bullock and Julia Roberts. Obviously, Hollywood couldn't care less about what black men would like to see.
The sex scene in "Monsters Ball" is so graphic that according to Berry, herself, her husband walked out of the theater. I feel you there, Eric. I don't even want to see it. And, we must remember that when the movie industry finds that a particular type of movie is successful, it makes a whole bunch more just like it. So, you can bet that if Halle wins an Oscar for "Monster's Ball," and maybe even just because of the acclaim her portrayal has generated, we can expect to see more movies with fine black
women gettin' down with mangy, white redneck 'billybobs' that
dehumanize and execute their black men.
After all, vicious racists need love too. I find that prospect truly
monstrous.
I Take No Pride In Halle Berry's Oscar Nomination
By Miles Willis
As an African-American man, I find nothing to be proud of in actress Halle Berry's recent Academy Award nomination. I haven't even seen the film, so it's not that I don't think her performance deserves to be so recognized. Nor is the significance of her nomination, and its potential for opening up more doors and attitudes for black actresses, lost upon me. I simply find
the premise of "Monster's Ball," in which a character played by one of our most prized beauties, falls in love with a racist white prison guard, (played by an actor named Billy Bob no less,) who led her late husband to his execution, is deliberately insulting. With its profanely incongruous and utterly implausible scenario, the plot of this film is a sneering, in-your-face taunt to all black men.
Imagine the seething indignation that a Jewish man might feel while watching a story in which the widow of a Nazi concentration camp victim has an intimate relationship with the SS officer that shoved her husband into one of those ovens at Auschwitz!
And for Ms. Berry, "Monster's Ball" is unfortunately just the latest
screening, at least since 1992's "Boomerang," in which we must endure seeing her in the throes of passion with white men. Her character boldly exposed her breasts to a white man in the movie "Swordfish," another 'got down' with an old white senator in "Bullworth," and had two white men, husband and lover/co-conspirator, in playing "The Rich Man's Wife."
Of course portraying Dorothy Dandridge required Berry's character, as Dandridge once described her own romantic/marital relationships, to 'throw (herself) at white men.' It seems that that's all Hollywood will throw at Ms. Berry. I don't think that it's mere coincidence. The motivation behind this phenomenon is clearly rooted in the legacy of slavery. Many plantation owners were notorious sexual predators who forced themselves upon slave women and girls of their choice at their leisure, and
their men were powerless to stop it.
On today's plantation, Hollywood confirms that 'old times there (truly) are not forgotten' as they recreate those longed-for days of unrestricted dalliances with their chattel by casting the best looking black actresses with white actors. At the same time they marginalize black men, both in front of and behind the camera, into cinematic inferiority and insignificance, denying them access to the opportunity to tell passionate tales of black people in love. Except for the all-black film adaptations of "Carmen" and "Porgy and Bess," the latter having been referred to by some black actors as a 'c**n show,' Dandridge, always near the top of any list of all-time most beautiful African-American women, never had an on-screen black lover, or an off-screen one for that matter, since only white men could advance her career. Lena Horne never played opposite white actors, but felt compelled to marry a white man just so that she could more fully enjoy the accoutrements of her show business celebrity.
Fast forward to 1992, with Whitney Houston who starred in the movie, "The Bodyguard." As one of the most successful pop singers in history, with cover-girl looks and proven crossover appeal, she could have made a romantic drama with Denzel, Wesley, Morris, etc., that would surely have been a box office smash. Instead, Hollywood produced a big budget, heavily promoted blockbuster in which Whitney's character takes a white man as her protector and lover. I felt snubbed and disrespected, having to just stand by and let 'Massa' take my woman for himself, just like before.
Now, let's flip the scenario, as we consider the country music vocalist Leann Rimes. She is a beautiful, successful recording artist, who surely will act in movies someday. But can you imagine her first role being analogous to Whitney's, that of a singer with a black bodyguard/lover? It's inconceivable! Why? I think it's because the media has so successfully demonized black men that the movie industry would run the risk of offending white male viewers with such a pairing.
But, they obviously have no such concerns about our sensibilities. Angela Bassett, a critically acclaimed and enchantingly beautiful actress, was Robert DeNiro's character's girlfriend in "The Score." Thandie Newton's character in the second "Mission Impossible" movie was shared between two white characters. Not to mention playing Sally Hemming to Nick Nolte's Thomas Jefferson. Even the original super-sister Pam Grier had a white lover in "Foxy Brown." And falling for a white bail bondsman who helped set up the murder of a black man, Samuel Jackson, in "Jackie Brown."
The main purpose of the movie industry is to create fantasy. And, it's pretty obvious whose fantasies Hollywood is trying to satisfy. I want to go to big-budget, action-packed, exciting, romantic, heavily promoted and critically acclaimed movies and see beautiful black women with guys who look, at least somewhat, like me. So that I can fantasize about them being with me, just like the white men do when they go see movies with beautiful
white women like Sandra Bullock and Julia Roberts. Obviously, Hollywood couldn't care less about what black men would like to see.
The sex scene in "Monsters Ball" is so graphic that according to Berry, herself, her husband walked out of the theater. I feel you there, Eric. I don't even want to see it. And, we must remember that when the movie industry finds that a particular type of movie is successful, it makes a whole bunch more just like it. So, you can bet that if Halle wins an Oscar for "Monster's Ball," and maybe even just because of the acclaim her portrayal has generated, we can expect to see more movies with fine black
women gettin' down with mangy, white redneck 'billybobs' that
dehumanize and execute their black men.
After all, vicious racists need love too. I find that prospect truly
monstrous.
That's ludicrous to me. I'd take the NAACP Image Awards over the "Academy" any day...because that's all it is, the "academy" - the old guard of Hollywood that will probably never change.
