Love: Part II

What a bizarre and oddly commemorated Valentine’s Day I had. I went out for lunch with a guy that I have known for many years in New Zealand who is now here, but it was purely a business meeting – yes, just a four hours long business meeting. Then after a trip to the vintage clothing store we went looking for the river and found some great underpasses in Leeds and I got completely saturated.

When it came time for me to get ready for the evening, he seemed very loath to let me go – he was having a lonely time of it here in England so far from home and without his girlfriend and I think he just wanted company. The more I get to know of boys, the more I see how scared and fragile so many are.

An angry woman smashed into me while I was en route back to Opera North and called me a fat slag. So that was my Valentine’s Day salutation!

I had pizza dinner and went to see 12 Years a Slave at The Light cinema in Leeds. The movie inspired a lively discussion back at our house about what racism meant in the 21^st Century. We also talked about the romanticism of “the other” in fiction and in the minds of white people and how this could be a form of racism. Michelle (new flatmate from Guyana) argued that the political/ governmental systems in places like the Solomon Islands could be seriously problematic and it was a mistake to romanticize them. We talked about what the world might have been like today without colonisation. Michelle said there’s always been bloodshed in tribal communities, which is of course true, but I argued that you can’t compare the scale of these murders to what has been committed at the hands of white men and imperialism.  We talked into the small hours over Jeff Buckley and trash TV and took with us to bed some discomforting issues that will never be resolved.

Michelle managed to coin one of my favourite new phrases in relation to a certain specimen of masculinity in our household who shall remain nameless, bestowing upon his heavy make-up wearing internet hookups the title of “crayola gang-bangers.”

Not really relevant to the purposes of this important film, but entertaining nonetheless.

Slavery still occurs in America in many guises. A lot of people have complained that this film didn’t need to be made as they already know slavery is bad. It’s that level of familiarity – and comfort – with the history of slavery that is precisely the reason this story needs to be told.

I find it rather interesting that this film was created by a black British man, not an African-American, and that he has spoken with such a clear and uncompromising voice on this chapter in American history. There have been two good films out this year that are still relevant to the ongoing issues of black-white segregation and pre-programmed notions (I include my own suppositions in this count) about cultural identity: 12 Years a Slave and The Butler. These film subjects are still current events as far as I can tell. Therefore it seems a mystery why America has refused to accept them. But not such a mystery when you realise the true extent of ingrained patterns of thinking about race in America that still exist today, and what it might mean for America if they really faced up to it. Then you start to realise why.

Views in some press circles of “nothing new to see here”, espoused by the likes of Richard Cohen in the Washington Post and virally lampooned by Amy Poehler in this year’s Golden Globes, are in my opinion far too simplistic and a disservice to this particular film.

I’ll restate this because it’s important. Segregation may no longer be overt. We may (hopefully) inherently be decent enough to sense the wrongness of slavery. It’s not something we have to think about as it engenders a pre-programmed response. And that’s all the more reason that these stories need to be told. Yes, I will never really know what these people went through at the hands of, let’s face it, my ancestors, if lived a million lifetimes. Yes, we are different. And every day of my life I let myself down by unquestioningly accepting falsehoods that are fed to me about why divisions between us are simply natural. This movie forced me to challenge that, far more than a movie package with easy resolutions like 'The Help'. Also, I sure hope there’s a sequel, and that it’s called ‘Patsey’s Revenge: Patsey Enslaves Sadistic Plantation Owner and Places his Testicles Strategically in the Vicinity of American Independence-era Meat Tenderising Apparatus’ – because I sure don’t like where the producers left off with the remaining slaves once Solomon was freed. Loose ends everywhere. No conclusively happy or otherwise endings. Nothing but a complete account of the dehumanizing aspects of life as a human commodity and the attempted complete destruction of a man’s mind, body and soul.

There were definitely times when I wanted to look away but I’m glad I didn’t. Still people persisted with the issue after the film that the violence was hyper-realised. How? In what way was this an unrealistic depiction of the realities of slavery? That’s not a rhetorical question. This happened. That's inconvenient for a lot of people, I know.

I may quibble about those yanks and confederates, but I’m pretty happy with the film industry just about now; I recently saw the new Coen Brother’s movie which didn’t completely engage me but did ring true and is certainly a worthy addition to their back catalogue.  I keep seeing trailers for films I want to see. Not to mention the spectacularly good ads here on British TV that keep me constantly entertained with their inventiveness, and their seemingly never-ending procession of cute animals and dead celebrities:

 If only I could get the British plumbing at our flat working, I’d be really happy. Can anyone tell me why British toilets won’t flush?

Check out this amazing music from Gary Clark Jr and 12 Years a Slave. The soundtrack from this film is great stuff.

This is the first serious and important depiction of American slavery our century has seen and I predict it will become a cornerstone of African American history in the filmic canon alongside 'Roots.'