For Colored Girls (Don't Read This If You Haven't Seen It)

I’m still a bit shell shocked.

I’ve been sitting here, going back and forth, reading and re-reading, and reviewing and pondering all the way home because I’ve been shell shocked ever since I walked out of that movie house.

I finally saw “For Colored Girls”.

I was adamant that no one tell me anything about the movie before I saw it. I wanted to experience it for myself, in its entirety, without hearing anyone else’s opinion about it before I saw it.  As the time elapsed, this became more and more difficult. Social media being the devil that it is, many people commented on the intensity of the movie in their statuses. They posted their opinions in clever tweets, and found ways to criticize both the movie and the maker of the movie, Tyler Perry, in one breath. It is no secret that Mr. Perry’s work is critically acclaimed and/or reviled, depending on who you’re asking. This was his first attempt at something assumingly more powerful than his more socially popular “Madea” work, and I was interested to see how the venture worked out for him. I was also curious to see how he would manage to turn a series of 20 intense poems into a screenplay that worked.

Now.

After having seen it, I walked in relative silence for quite some time. As a Sagittarius, I am analytical to a fault, examining every angle, every nuance…and then examining it again. I listened quietly as my cousins expressed their general emotions, malaise, cursed out some passerby for being in the way, etc…and I simply listened to them talk. I was lost in my own thoughts.

When I got home, before I started writing this, I decided to sit down and go through some of the reviews finally to see what the critics – and other people that I didn’t know – were saying about the movie. No matter where I looked, they all started something like this:

“My admiration for Tyler Perry's phenomenal and influential showmanship is undimmed, but facts are facts: The craft of filmmaking is not his strong suit." 

- Lisa Shwartzbaum, EW.com

 

“As much as you want to give Tyler Perry the benefit of the doubt that maybe he'd be better at adapting someone else's work than showcasing his own, it's pretty obvious by the end of "For Colored Girls" that the best thing going for it are the performances of Ntozake Shange's words by Perry's infinitely talented cast.” 

– Edward Douglas, comingsoon.net 

I’ll even throw in one more for good measure…

“So let's just say that For Colored Girls is a barely competent film (which is a big step up for Perry), illuminated by luminous performances. In the hands of another filmmaker, those actresses might have approached an award-winning level. Too bad.” 

– Marshall Fine, Huff Post Review

Now. So far, all of these reviews have been rather critical of Tyler’s work on this film, and, though they acknowledge the outstanding cast that Perry managed to pull together for the film, both female and male, for the most part, they find the movie does not reach the standard that it should. I could go so far as to say that none of these reviewers are African-American, but I remember seeing some of my friends’ commentary regarding the film – the words “male bashing”, “poor attempt by a lackluster director”, and “Tyler needs to let someone co-direct movies with him” come to immediate mind.

So. After pondering all the reviews that I’d read, I asked myself: Did I miss something along the way? Did we not watch the same movie, and perhaps I missed it somewhere? I was tempted to look at my ticket stub and call the theatre to make sure I’d watched the right movie. I couldn’t understand it – what was wrong with ‘For Colored Girls’?

Ok. Let me be nice about this.

Wait a damn minute. No I will NOT!

I’m sick of the Tyler Perry bashing. I’m not a diehard fan of his, not by any means. But why are we so quick to diminish his work as un-meaningful? What, because in his first films, the message is delivered by a 6’2 black ‘wo’man? Okay, AND? At least SOMEONE is getting the message out! The reality is that we live in a fickle society where Real Housewives runs the airwaves and we complain about wanting to have something more of substance out but we do nothing to make it happen. We complain that we’re not on Broadway, but then when we are, in a real setting with real things that really happen, we complain about the content. Or how the message is delivered. (Think The Scottsboro Boys. How many people have seen THAT? Don’t worry…I’ll wait…)

Why do we want the message to be so sweetly delivered, and NOT by Tyler Perry?

For Colored Girls – the screenplay version – was well adapted to hold the viewers’ attention for a lengthy period of time. Perry managed to somehow take a series of powerful poems and turn it into something that anyone could watch, black or white. I hear critics complaining about the lack of crossover appeal. So…other races aren’t raped? Or abused? Or in down low relationships? Or promiscuous? Or in affairs? Do I actually need to continue? No, he didn’t include other races in the main roles…did he have to? What, you no longer can relate because the person doesn’t have the same color as you?

Ntozake Shange, originator of the poem “for colored girls who have considered suicide/ when the rainbow is enuf”, even said in a NY Times interview of the screenplay, “I think it’s very good. He kept a lot of my language, that’s what I liked most.” She was at hand for all of the re-writes, all of the transformation, and Perry managed to create a storyline to lure in the viewer, all while keeping the original power of the poetry in the film. And powerful it was. One couldn’t help but get sucked into everyone’s story, even the ones that seemed obvious – Thandie Newton’s character ‘Tangie (Orange)’ and her sister Tessa Thompson ‘s character ‘Nyla (Purple)’ being the most obvious of all (who didn’t know that girl was pregnant when she threw up outside?), and you watched yourself being drawn in by the power of each story and the power of the women fighting them. The story was less about male bashing – in fact, it wasn’t male bashing at all – and more about the struggles that the women face and how they find a way to overcome it. And yes, it may have seen cliché at times – but it’s a movie…not a miniseries. There’s only but so much that you can put into a movie to make it all work – especially something of this caliber.

I have much much more that I could say about this – but I’d rather hear your thoughts…because I will surely ramble… 

Posted in: critique, for colored girls, ntozage shange, review, tessa thompson, thandie newton, the scottsboro boys, tyler perry