Hey everyone. Capone in Chicago here.
This film affords me the opportunity to do something I've never once done: review a Tyler Perry-directed film. (I'd also one day love to interview the man because I think his life and career are fascinating.) As difficult as it may be to believe, I've seen every single Perry joint since his 2005 big-screen debut DIARY OF A MAD BLACK WOMAN (which he didn't actually direct), and it seems that about every six to nine months, the man drops another film that either tackles some seriously silly material or a heightened drama or an unstable combination of the two. I've actually liked a couple of his films outright, but more often than not what I enjoy are certain sections of each film. Pretty much anything featuring Perry's female alter-ego Madea, I can't stand. It just isn't that funny. And while some critics who have reviewed his films in the past tend to take the position that Perry isn't a big fan of black men (who seem to be the villains in 100 percent of his films), I choose to think he just expects more of them than society seems to.
With this in mind, it seems that the 1974 Tony-winning play from Ntozake Shange, "For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When The Rainbow Is Enuf," would be right up Perry's alley in terms of its focus on the struggles of black women. The play was a series of poetic monologues spoken by one of nine women, but Perry has done something kind of remarkable with FOR COLORED GIRLS and turned that format into a series of interweaving stories, but with many of the monologues still very much in place. He's updated a couple of the characters' worlds (Perry introduces HIV into one of the women's lives), and he's turned the monologues into these rhythmic injections of a self-discovery and self-awareness that brought out some very deep emotions in this white male audience member.
Played by some of the most gifted black actresses of our time (Loretta Devine, Thandie Newton, Janet Jackson, Whoopi Goldberg, Kimberly Elise, Phylicia Rashad, Anika Noni Rose, Tessa Thompson and Kerry Washington), these women are put through some awful tests of endurance--rape, physical abuse, the death of children, the absence of self respect, back-alley abortions, personal heartbreak, and the list goes on. What FOR COLORED GIRLS emphasizes to perfection is not that people can make it through such tragedies through inner strength, but that often inner strength comes from a communal experience and relying on others to carry you through the toughest times. This isn't a story about prayer or God, in fact the religious woman (Goldberg) is treated with a great deal of disdain. Instead, this is a call for women to unify around their shared experiences at the hands of men. (Sorry, dudes. While there are certainly a couple of nice guys in this movie, most of the men in this film are still the oppressors.)
While all of the actresses in FOR COLORED GIRLS are quite good, I want to single out a couple who are doing things I've simply never seen before. Kimberly Elise (BELOVED, JOHN Q, THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE, DIARY OF A MAD BLACK WOMAN) is a goddess here as Crystal, a woman whose children are taken from her quite cruelly in a sequence that will haunt me for years to come. But even before that, she's endured years of physical abuse by a mentally unstable boyfriend (Michael Ealy) and mental abuse by her boss, a fashion magazine editor (Jackson). When Crystal finally collapses, Elise sells it so solidly that I don't know how either of them crawled back out of that hole. Her performance will quite simply destroy you and, eventually, fortify you. Another tremendous effort comes from Anika Nomi Rose (DREAMGIRLS) as Yasmine, who must find the strength to pull her life back together after a graphic sexual assault. The scenes of her cowering in her apartment are painful to watch.
I was also most impressed with Rashad's work as Gilda in FOR COLORED GIRLS. Rashad has pretty much owned the stage since her time opposite Bill Cosby. She plays the soothing voice of reason in an apartment building where a few of the characters live or visit frequently. I just look at her, and I feel a little bit better about the world. The monologues are handled quite nicely. Characters slip in and out of delivering them almost like they had fallen asleep (or perhaps finally woken up) and are someplace where poetry is the language of the time and place. (It's not that different than watching a musical where characters move from speaking to singing and back.) And the words... my goodness, those words are something powerful. Rose's speech about rape is traumatic. Thandie Newton's Tangie delivers a harsh poem about channeling the hatred she feels toward her mother (Goldberg) into an uncontrolled succession of sexual conquests, bringing home a different man every night. A lot of For Colored Girls is going to make you very uncomfortable, and every once and while that's probably an okay thing to happen.
I saw this film in a roomful of critics, many of whom were visibly shaken by its power (me included), some even cried. But I'd really love to see this film again with a paying crowd. It doesn't happen nearly enough that I get to share that unhindered emotional experience at any kind of movie, and I can only imagine what the outpouring of pure feeling would be like at FOR COLORED GIRLS. For those who think Perry is strictly an amateur-hour filmmaker, this work should at least temporarily silence that crowd. Clearly a passion project for Perry, one he took his time piecing together, FOR COLORED GIRLS takes the shortest and most painful way into your soul and rides it out until you're a quaking mess of pure liquid emotion. Yes ultimately, the film leaves us lifted and ready to face life head on thanks to these remarkable women. Don't be afraid of this one; step into the light and be a little bit reborn.
-- Capone
capone@aintitcool.com
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