racist movie

[deleted]

This can be a really heated subject (proved by all the deleted posts early in this thread), and I certainly don't want to invalidate anyone's opinion or point of view. I think a lot of people have said a lot of intelligent things in this thread, and I don't have a lot to add. But I just had the thought that in the movie a lot of people are portrayed poorly. A lot of people come off badly. But just because people of a certain color are portrayed badly, does that make a work of art racist? I don't think so. Is the Godfather a racist movie because most of the Italians in it are criminals? I am trying to think of an actual racist work of art that I have encountered in the last 30 years, and I can't really think of one (other than Leni Riefenstahl's propaganda movies). I mean, here is a definition of the word "racist:" "a person who believes in racism, the doctrine that a certain human race is superior to any or all others." I find it really hard to believe than anyone could watch BOTV and come away with that as a message in the movie. Everyone, of all races, is portrayed as opportunistic, and willing to exploit circumstances to their benefit. It's a satire about the foibles of humankind.

I think a better word might be shocking--it is probably shocking for younger people to see Sherman's reaction to the black youths in the beginning. Yes, he was a white guy scared just because two black kids approach him in a dark secluded place--I think a fear much more commonly held by a certain segment of society in 1987 when the book was written. The presentation is a bit coarse by today's standards--similar themes were explored with more subtly and finesse in a movie like Crash. But the point of the movie is not to suggest that black guys are dangerous; the point was to illuminate that this is the reaction that someone like Sherman would have. It was shining the light on the stereotype held by Sherman, brilliantly. It doesn't say that the stereotype is true or accurate. In fact, Sherman's reaction is possibly what leads to all the trouble. Possibly he could have said, "Yes, I need help with this tire," and they would have helped him--that ambivalence exists in the movie (as it does in the book). Just because a character in a movie believes in a certain stereotype doesn't mean the work of art is racist.

Least anyone call me racist, I am black woman who grew up in Alabama in the 70s, and I have encountered real racism. I can tell you the world has changed dramatically in the last 40 years in terms of racial attitudes in America. Things have definitely gotten better, so much so that a person seeing this movie for the first time today who is say 25 or younger may really be shocked at Sherman's attitude, and it may look racist to them, whereas when it came out, it was just taken for granted that a man like Sherman might be likely to react that way in that situation.

I think it's a good movie and a brilliant book, and I don't think it's racist,

I'm a liberal but I love Tom Wolfe's books irrespective of his political sympathies, and to be fair, he usually portrays his liberal characters with as much understanding and sympathy as his conservative ones. The difference is that most liberal authors would be inclined to present the conservatives, whose views they fins abhorrent, as terrible two-dimensional individuals.

I do think the novel does take a fascinating alternative perspective to the typical politically-correct one. Like you state, it's apolitical. A staunchly liberal perspective wouldn't allow room for the possibility of a WASP being innocent of a hit and run involving a black youth, whereas a staunchly conservative perspective would present McCoy as a more unambiguously heroic character/martyr.

However, I do have to take some exception to your signature. Many liberals think conservatives are 'stupid' (many conservatives are associated with being anti-science and anti-Rule of Law).