Tag: Racial Stereotypes

Revisiting ‘Down In The Delta,’ Maya Angelou’s Only Feature Film

Down in the Delta film poster.
I love, LOVE Maya Angelou.
She is one of my favorite inspirational women of all time, and I could praise her remarkable contributions to writing and activism forever.
When I discovered that she directed only one feature film, a film I had actually seen long ago, I decided to give it another watch and looked online. Thank you, Netflix!
Down in The Delta, with a screenplay by Myron Goble, begins with Loretta Sinclair, an undereducated African American woman strung out on drugs and alcohol, raising two children in a three-generational household, and struggling to find a job in rough Chicago. Upset that she cannot answer a single mathematical equation or find a job sweeping or mopping floors at a corner store, she dives deeper into the free, alluring drug world and her mother has to save her yet again.
In films and television, the poor single mother angle never stops, and adding lack of book smarts becomes a horse beaten to death. I personally didn’t think Angelou would angle into this pigeonholed concept of minority women, but eventually Alfre Woodard turned into a “Phenomenal Woman”–just not in the most congratulatory manner.
Rosa Lyn (Mary Alice) has a big idea that will keep her daughter on the righteous track.
Rosa Lyn, Loretta’s savior of a mother, pawns off a sterling silver candelabra heirloom (which is nicknamed “Nathan”). Loretta looks at it both shocked and hungry–that notorious expression of a drug fiend knowing prize could score ample amounts of desired inebriation. Alas, Rosa Lyn only intends that Nathan be sacrificed in order to pay for bus tickets so that Loretta and her kids have a brighter future down south.
However, Rosa Lyn wants Loretta to earn the money necessary to get Nathan back in the family.
Rosa Lyn (Mary Alice) pawns off Nathan the candelabra for bus tickets to Tracy (Kulania Hessan), Nathan (Mpho Koaho), and Loretta (Alfre Woodard).
Away from tempting drugs and hardship, Earl asks Loretta to work for him at his restaurant, Just Chicken, and teaches her how to make his famous chicken sausages. She has a hard time getting it right, but eventually she does and moves onto playing a bigger role into the restaurant field. This leads to the most disappointing part of the film. She discovers purpose not just in the Delta itself, but inside of a greasy chicken sausage joint. The situation isn’t particularly humorous or exciting. In fact, speaking from a vegan standpoint, I find it pretty distasteful, especially as a climactic point. When the small town bands together to stop the closing of the chicken plant, it becomes a cheesy outstretched manifesto of people proudly boasting about their beloved meat, disregarding slaughterhouses where the most incredibly unimaginable suffering takes place–a sacrificial unwanted suffering so eerily similar to that of Jesse. Chickens are forced into small cages, plucked and boiled alive, and all kinds of other horrors before being murdered, but Angelou praises the long hindered stereotype about African Americans’ adoration of chicken. It is heard so clearly that ears start to bleed from preaching. One wonders if  that passion would remain devoutly strong if fruits and vegetable crops were similarly threatened.
I’m not trying to bash the love of chicken, but the chicken and African American relationship is so difficult to handle that it in itself becomes ludicrously overdone. The closeness to joining hands and singing spirituals left behind a sour taste.
However, the story behind Nathan the candelabra serves as a better narrative and has Angelou’s signature poignancy all over the polished sentimentality. Jesse, a family ancestor, stole the valuable sterling silver antique from his former owners, an act of revenge instilled inside since age six when watching his father get sold off auction block style, as though he were nothing more than a common object, not a human being with mind and beating heart. Candelabra, named Nathan after a father Jesse never found, has been passed down to the male line, but Eddie gives it to Loretta, marking a new sense of tradition, a new entrusted foundation.
Years ago, no one would have ever considered her worthy.
Loretta (Alfre Woodard) and Earl (the late Al Freeman Jr.) have much in common.
Down In The Delta brushes on Alzheimer’s Disease and autism and beautifully weaves how family copes with the two perilous circumstances. In one of Esther Rolle’s final roles, she plays Annie, Earl’s wife. It is wonderful how much Earl cares about Annie and has overprotective need to keep her safe from harm. But he has to keep doors and windows locked, shielding Annie inside a childproof environment.
“First she couldn’t find her keys,” states Earl. “Then she forgot what the keys were for.”
Meanwhile, Tracy, Loretta’s autistic daughter, has screamed, cried, and hollered nearly the entire film, leaving terrified strangers to think her a monstrous and demonic child. In a scene after the bus arrives at a location, a distraught woman blasts Loretta’s parenting skills, blaming her for not being able to control Tracy. Everyone wonders why Loretta keeps Tracy inside of a crib, but like Earl, Loretta is protecting Tracy from endangering herself. Angelou parallels Earl and Loretta’s dealings with disease, their gnawing frustrations and little triumphs, and bridges their connection closer together. It is not romantic, but friendly, familial, and bittersweet, one that succeeds because they provide comfort to each other. 
Loretta also spends time with Annie’s caretaker, Zenia who offers her beer. Now Loretta, appearing uncomfortable and noticeably silent, could have easily declined. Alcoholism is a real disease to master and for her to suddenly kick back and have a chuckle makes light of the real difficulty people have just being around a bottle–having one little drink (or in this case, a whole bottle) is downright impossible.
The late Roger Ebert, however, was one of several critics who enjoyed Down in the Delta:
“Angelou’s first-time direction stays out of its own way; she doesn’t call attention to herself with unnecessary visual touches, but focuses on the business at hand. She and [Myron] Goble are interested in what might happen in a situation like this, not in how they can manipulate the audience with phony crises. When Annie wanders away from the house, for example, it’s handled in the way it might really be handled, instead of being turned into a set piece.”
Down in the Delta ends with the “feel good” message that life can be filled with turmoil and can appear inescapable, especially to a minority woman, but it’s never too late to turn things around. After Nathan is “rescued” from the pawn shop and handed down to Loretta, everyone now trusts her, the threat of drugs/alcoholism disappears, and Earl promotes her to running Just Chicken so that he can spend more time with Annie. Loretta now has reached a positive place. 
As director, Maya Angelou’s spirit floated between the Mississippi-centered delta, but sometimes drifted away like it was never there.
However, that doesn’t mean that I don’t want her to make another film. 
In fact, I wish she would.

‘Fruitvale Station’ Humanizes the Pigeonholed African American Father/Child Relationship

Fruitvale Station film poster.

“I got a daughter…” groans Oscar Grant. “He just shot me…”
Lying face down, a coward’s bullet inside his back, young Oscar’s black-brown eyes water, blood spews between his purple lips, redness staining bright white teeth that had smiled with an infinite amount of mesmerizing happiness prior to Oscar’s unjustly end.
One person dominates his mind, one little female of great importance.
In Fruitvale Station, Ryan Coogler’s first independent feature film, Oscar’s final words bring forth poignant honesty that dismantles the absentee black father, that negative stereotype surrounding black culture, haunting it like a skeletal ghost refusing to die. The precious gift of fatherhood is robbed from Oscar, shot into the perilous night by a senseless white police officer. It is the kind of tragedy seen every day in America–a young black man murdered, his life thrown into a casket and immediately glossed over, swept aside for the next victim without any real emphasis behind his personal story. Media would say a black man died today, talk about surviving relatives, and–like a conveyor belt moving fast inside a methodical slaughterhouse factory–another man takes his place.

Coogler focuses on the last day of Oscar Grant’s life, specifically his relationships between his mother, Wanda, his girlfriend, Sophina and their daughter, Tatiana–a definitive, commendable highlight. To Oscar, Tatiana is everything. Media portrays the African American father as never present and always on the hunt for sowing his wild oats. Despite its setting against horrendous ill-conceived logic, however, Fruitvale Station is no Pursuit of Happyness Will/Jaden Smith film either. There is no happy ending here. Set in an urban foundation, the bond between a father and his daughter is tested by a system designed to fail black men.

Tatianna (Arianna Neal) is the apple of Oscar’s (Michael B. Jordan) eye.

Now unfortunately, I’m all too familiar with the “black father not being around” stereotype. I grew up in a single-mother household, second oldest of five kids–three fathers between us. I breathed that negative stimulus of being a fatherless child all throughout my life. I admired my peers’ stick figure families with dads in them and hated whenever June came around. Eventually, I found my father, but it became even tougher to deal with the fact that I had five other siblings–all in different states. So yes, while it is tough to face difficult situations, one must move over the past and not become oppressed by it. Otherwise it becomes a pattern. 

Oscar’s biological father doesn’t appear to be around either, but the love offered from his supportive mother is tenderly passed down to his daughter and rendered with a remarkable tranquility that is difficult to turn away from. It is like a lesson has been passed down. That “I’ll do everything in my power not to be like my father” mentality is endearing and honestly portrayed. Laughter, pride and joy are magically threaded together, humanizing the reality of the American black father, showcasing his imperative role in the upbringing of a precociously bright daughter. I didn’t feel this extreme jealousy or envy while seeing him depicted as a strong, caring parent who adores and nurtures his child–that sustenance missing from my painful childhood. 

Oscar is no martyr, no betrayer. He is a catalyst. I sense hope for change, a harrowing desire for other filmmakers to portray the black man as a hero to be worshiped by his own offspring, to inspire a generation still believing the worst about his race, shooting him down just because his brown skin incites “fear.”
“Do you want her to come down here? See you like this?” Wanda asks, speaking of Tatiana, after Oscar has been jailed for the implied umpteenth time.
She moved me to tears in this scene when she abruptly admits she cannot take it, rises out of her seat, and boldly walks away. She almost breaks down, but her strength–that same tenacity flowing through Oscar’s veins–allows her to rein it all in. This solidifying moment, set just a year before Oscar’s death, defined Oscar’s passion to change, to truly make a genuine effort as a father. He knows that he cannot guide Tatiana from behind bars, that in order to be a good, responsible role model the most important rule is just to be present, and not take advantage of time.

Tomorrow is never ever promised, especially for a black man.

Coincidentally enough, black men are often penalized for killing each other–at times with no possibility for parole; but on the other hand, people of other races receive light sentences on killing black men because black men are still seen as expendable. Johannes Mehserle served eleven months out of a paltry two-year prison sentence for killing Oscar. George Zimmerman is free for shooting an armless teenager. These slap on the wrists transpire every single day. Throughout the course of America’s grisly racist history, families continue grieving lost loved ones, a mother’s mourning the most bereft because justice continues murdering her children and telling her it’s fair.

Tatiana (Arianna Neal) and her father (Michael B. Jordan).

Fruitvale Station is a film that confronts viewers with love–the love that a black man feels for his family, his friends, his girlfriend. This is not some ridiculous caricature with watermelons and fried chicken. These people eat lobster and celebrate life together. There’s no oppression or fodder. They are connected to one another through Oscar, who says “I love you” to everyone through words, laughter, and body language. When he tells his daughter stories, they are not inventive lies or tall tales, promises of a better life. He doesn’t say, “Yeah! We’re going to Disneyland tomorrow!” He may not be a wealthy man, he may be struggling a bit, but real unconditional love is what keeps him going, what sets him in a positive direction. 
After the death of a symbolic pit bull, a shining array of wisdom captures Oscar in a beguiling light. He sits on rocks and tosses a fat bag of weed into the river and doesn’t take any of his friend’s wad. Reflection has created a striking change in Oscar, an enlightened promise to become a better man, a better father, a respectful, worthy being. Before the credits roll, as he clings to life on his beeping hospital bed, viewers are left with what are possibly his concluding thoughts before death–that of Tatiana, his guiding light, his North Star in a world filled with darkness, in a world crueler than a black man selling dope in the street corners to survive and provide.

Tatiana’s (Arianna Neal) fear for Oscar (Michael B. Jordan) is a disheartening premonition.

Oscar makes mistakes, but he always set out to right wrongs and often speaks on future dreams.
It is hard to breathe in a society that programs us how to think, taking away the mentality of the colored person, reshaping them only to a fit comforting representation–the joking, laughing spectacle. The moment a black man, especially as a father, is shaped into a person experiencing real struggles and hardships, the jester masquerade is over. It is impossible for lips to crack a smile. An ugly illustration of residue is left behind. A suffering mother stares at the lifeless body she isn’t allowed to hold again, barred from nearness. Even death has become another prison cell. Then there’s the daughter. She knows that her father is not going to outrace her in front of schoolmates or take her to Chucky Cheese or let her sleep between him and her mother.
Fruitvale Station ends somberly, the note quiet and gut wrenching. Coogler is not only crying out for retribution, for understanding, but for dignity and honor for those black men murdered without any sense of decency or remorse for the lives they have touched–family, friends, passing strangers.
Most gently, however, Coogler gives black fathers their due. 

Wedding Week: "Jumping The Broom" Addresses Racial Hangups While Marrying Ancestral Tradition

Jumping the Broom poster.
Uh oh!
Sabrina Watson has done it again!
“I promise you, God, if you get me out of this situation, I’ll only share my cookies with the man I marry,” she exclaims subconsciously.
Jumping the Broom is Arlene Gibbs first screenwriting credit.
Jumping The Broom, co-written by two women — Arlene Gibbs and Elizabeth Hunter (Beauty Shop and Abducted: The Carlina White Story), beats up tired stereotypes, plays religious poker, and opens up a can of scandalous worms at a wedding for two successful African American lovebirds who’ve only known each other for six months- Sabrina Watson and Jason Taylor.
Exciting, smart, and worldly, Sabrina is a formerly licentious woman seeking to change her approach in regards to relationships and calls on the Lord Almighty for aide; promising to stop fooling around with unworthy men. Salvation arrives in the form of Jason. After she accidentally hits him with her car, she apologizes profusely and makes it up to him by introducing refined, cultured sides of life- theaters, opera, and art galleries all while vowing celibacy. He certainly doesn’t mind waiting for the latter and enjoys the pain free newness she brings to his life.
By month five, Sabrina has received an opportunity of a lifetime — a promotion in China. Jason doesn’t appear thrilled; saying that he can’t be in a long distance relationship. This breaks Sabrina’s heart in an awkward scene. She gives him back gifted red rose, stares sideways at him, teary eyed, looking for validation and a singer’s serenade grows louder as quiet tension builds between the couple.
Jason (Laz Alonso) springs on the ultimate surprise for Sabrina (Paula Patton).
But alas, Jason proposes, wants to marry immediately, and move with Sabrina to China! A man willing to change lifestyle habits, possibly career, and fly around the world for a woman? Yes!
Opening credits roll with black and white montage celebrating happily wedded blissful couples still carrying on a tradition used in weddings today.
Jumping the Broom focuses on two strong customs — one being jumping the broom that has predated slavery, which Jason’s mother Pamela strongly supports, and saving sex for marriage. Sabrina and Jason obviously have strong physical desires for one another, but they’re willing to postpone physical intercourse and are continuing to know each other on various intimate levels- emotional primarily. This isn’t essentially common in most romantic films, especially an African American centric film.
Jumping the Broom co writer, Elizabeth Hunter.
Yes. The introduction reveals Sabrina to be a bit promiscuous, but she seems to always be regretful and ashamed by one night “cookie” stands. She commits to moralistic goals in ironclad obligation; having to even “fight” Jason off with a few kisses and eloquent French tongued whispers to temporarily dampen his arousing impatience.
The opinions that run amok between Sabrina’s and Jason’s prospective parties include many stereotypes in ideas of rushed marriage. Some believe that Jason has gotten Sabrina pregnant including Claudine, Sabrina’s overbearing mother. It brings about this peculiar lifelong notion that if both parents are unionized into marriage sanctity, the unborn child would be protected from the “sin” of being born on the wrong side of the blanket. The added plus is that the woman would be a wife and “saved” from “Baby’s Mama” label. Others, the ones who know that Sabrina and Jason haven’t slept together, believe that Jason is either cheating or being on the “down low.” This is also particularly disturbing. It’s incredibly mind-boggling that a man who can refrain from sex must be unfaithful or gay! When Jason confesses that he can hold out longer- a few weeks, but still, it just suggests that patience truly exists in the world. He was probably a monk in his past life.
Lauren (Tenisha Davis), Sabrina (Paula Patton), and Blythe (Meagan Good) have pre-wedding girl talk.
The filmmakers are validating these society extremes and addressing that Sabrina and Jason’s friends should not incite intrusive gossip without honest facts and have a lot to learn about real love and integrity.
However, “jumping the broom!” is one tradition that Sabrina and Jason are dead set against and this infuriates Anger Management attendee Pamela to a heated rage.
It’s the formalistic Capulets versus the Montagues reincarnated as angry spiritual working class black lady verses the high cultured, fluent French speaking mother who- gasps- has traced her roots to her family actually owning slaves and says this in a boast filled breath.
Shondra (Tasha Smith) and Pamela (Loretta Devine) at the post office discussing Jason’s wedding.
At first, aristocratic Claudine Watson looks to be a cold, frozen wave of upper crust vile, but is instead a misunderstood, determined, intelligent woman bottling emotionally layered scars underneath sarcastic exterior. She believes her husband, Greg is cheating on her, has a severely strained relationship with her sister, Geneva, and doesn’t take well to the “ghetto” presence Jason’s family brings to the eloquent Watson Estate on Martha’s Vineyard. However, the shocking fact that her infertility, an unbearably complex subject matter to address, is revealed in a gutturally delivered slap that is just as painful sounding as the back palmed hand that delivers it.
And Pamela Taylor hears all the soapy juiciness. Now there’s a reason she wasn’t invited to the brunch held a month prior to the wedding date. It wasn’t because she works as a loud, outspoken, and rude post office worker. She has apparently ruined every relationship Jason’s ever had. Upset that Jason doesn’t want to carry on the family tradition and that ignorance is definitely not bliss when the Watsons have an angry French tirade about her “backward”comments, Pamela nastily destroys Sabrina’s perfect upbringing in front of everyone. It’s kind of pathetic that she can be hurtful, cling to Bible like a shield, and believe her actions are just. This allows Jason to finally give her an ultimatum- she has to change (as in be a mother figure to him) or not be in his life.
Sabrina (Paula Patton) with the woman who raised her, Claudine (Angela Bassett).
After brutal climax, Geneva tells runaway bride Sabrina the bitter truth about her parentage- she’s the product of an affair Geneva had at age sixteen with a married man in France. With the hefty amount of French the Watsons kept speaking, it’s safe to say that Paris is definitely the new Las Vegas. Except well, what happened in Paris didn’t exactly stay there, but at least the infertile Claudine and Greg got to love Sabrina from the start. Geneva gave Sabrina to Claudine because she was married which comes back to stereotypes of children born out of wedlock. Two parents are not only better than one, but a much stronger unit, especially married and this message cannot be implanted enough. Geneva may have been from a rich family, but Claudine had the motherly instincts she didn’t have at the time and it’s been quite obvious that Geneva was making up for that.
Jason (Laz Alonso) and his mother, Pamela (Loretta Devine).
Although the Watsons are not seen reading Bibles as much as Pamela is, the holy presence is stressed so strongly that it binds these two families like an invisible cord.
Gibbs and Hunter’s story also shed light on contradictions that sadly still exist. Julie Bowen’s character Amy plays the white servant who mutters ignorant racial fodder- “why is she so light” when seeing Claudine’s sister, she impermissibly touches Shonda’s braids like she was at a petting zoo, and complains about the chef who sees Jason’s family as being “chicken folk.” Funnily enough, Jason’s immature and equally ignorant cousin, Malcolm says comments such as “you’re pretty for a dark skinned girl” (the ugliest and most hurtful insult to a colored woman) and has a white people hate complex, but winds up being the one to dance with Amy. Maybe both of their prejudices are supposed to cancel each other out?
Before committing fully to Jason once more, Sabrina understands her family and accepts the truth.
Differences become swept aside. Claudine’s marriage isn’t as heartless as originally appeared and Pamela sets forth to live in the present. Other ladies find unintentional romance post nuptials. Stylish, sophisticated, Blythe- the best friend/maid of honor, fell for a poetic, complimentary sampling chef while charming, free-spirited, Shonda- joyously soaking in the Vineyard getaway and fighting hard against a younger cougar worshiping college man finally succumbed to his lips. Even Geneva lets her guard down a bit and dances with Uncle Willie- a man of slithery pick up lines and unlikable wisdom.
Sabrina (Paula Patton) and Jason (Laz Alonso) are married and will have cookies later!
At the wedding, however, Sabrina and Jason may have started off with their own traditions, but the moment they jumped over the broom and smiled hard at Pamela, the couple gave an appreciative nod towards history and fulfilled the screenplay’s destiny.
Jumping the Broom may borderline on containing too many preachy sanctimonious moments, but it teaches spiritual lessons that symbolize the “something old” wedding gift. It doesn’t matter where a person comes from. Whether it’s from the ghetto or the suburbs, one must value themselves first and then create personal hierarchy of what matters most- partners, family, friends, and successes. For Sabrina, she just wanted to be in love and share her cookies with a good man worthy enough to marry.
And that she did.

Travel Films Week: Othering and Alienation in ‘Lost in Translation’

Written by Robin Hitchcock

Charlotte (Scarlett Johansson) and Bob (Bill Murray) in Lost in Translation
Sofia Coppola’s Lost in Translation is remembered mostly for the genuinely affecting romance between its leads Scarlett Johansson and Bill Murray, but it also offers a singular depiction of culture shock. Unfortunately, in representing the “strangeness” of Japan through the eyes of its American characters, Lost in Translation often veers into racist stereotypes and caricatures. When the film was up for several Academy Awards including Best Picture in 2004, the anti-racism group Asian Mediawatch advocated an Oscar shut-out for the film because it “dehumanises the Japanese people by portraying them as a collection of shallow stereotypes who are treated with disregard and disdain.” [Despite this protest, Lost in Translation did garner writer–director Sofia Coppola an Oscar for Best Original Screenplay.]
Bob Harris (Bill Murray) stands tallest in a Japanese elevator
My viewing (as a white American) of Lost in Translation didn’t see disdain for Japan or Japanese people, but rather an aggressive othering, which of course is problematic in its own right. But emphasizing the differences between Tokyo and the American homeland of main characters Charlotte (Johansson) and Bob (Murray) is vital to the narrative of Lost in Translation: both characters are in crisis, unmoored in their daily lives, and the mundane discomfort of their foreign surroundings brings these deeper struggles to bear.
Charlotte looks out at Tokyo from her hotel room window
Focusing on the existential angst of two white Americans in Japan without any well-defined Japanese characters is enough to turn off many race-conscious viewers to begin with, and Lost in Translation doubles down with some cringeworthy Japanese stereotypes. The film gets alarming mileage out of its Japanese characters pronouncing l’s and r’s similarly, which feels even more dated than the also strangely boundless fax-machine humor in this 2003 film. Charlotte at one point asks Bob why “they mix up l’s and r’s” and he suggests it is “for yuks,” but it isn’t actually funny.
Take for example the biggest belly flop of a “comedic” scene in the film, in which an escort arrives at Bob’s hotel room; his host in Japan having gifted him with the “premium fantasy” package. She demands Bob “lip” her stockings. After a classic Bill Murray line reading of “Hey, ‘lip’ them, ‘lip’ them, what!?” the scene devolves as the escort one-sidedly plays out a rape fantasy. Too much of this scene rests on the “humor” of “lip” vs. “rip,” and the rest relies on judging sexism in Japanese business culture from a dubious moral high ground. It’s hard to watch.
Directions during a whiskey ad shoot are literally lost in translation
In contrast, the comedic highlights of the film are the shoots for the whiskey advertisement that brought Bob Harris to Tokyo. The humor in these scenes doesn’t come so much from mocking the Japanese characters as it does mining the disconnect between them and English-speaking Bob (alluding to the film’s title). The flashy director of the ad gives detailed, impassioned instructions in Japanese which are relayed to Bob in brief and inscrutable English directions (“Turn from the right, with intensity!” “Like an old friend, and into the camera.”)
Scarlet Johansson spends a lot of this movie looking out of windows.
Charlotte’s interactions with Japanese culture aren’t comedic, which is likely because Scarlett Johansson is not the established comedic actor that Bill Murray is. Instead, we get a lot of her gazing with wonder at beautiful scenery and meekly participating in ikebana. I think anyone who has ever been a tourist can relate to Charlotte’s wide-eyed stares out of cab windows, but her fascinated observation gets laid on a little thick and starts reeking of Orientalism. Early in the film she peers into a Buddhist temple and cries over the phone to a friend back home that it didn’t make her “feel anything.” That moment lends a lot of credence to those who would dismiss this film out of hand for its white-centricism. 
Charlotte (Scarlett Johansson) and Bob (Bill Murray) in Lost in Translation
But the true heart of Lost in Translation is the relationship between Charlotte and Bob, a sudden and profound connection between two lost souls that transcends its blurred line between friendship and romance. This connection is only credible because of these characters’ alienation in their surroundings, so the emphasis on Tokyo’s foreignness to them is important to the film. And from my limited and privileged perspective as a white American living abroad, the representation of culture shock as alternately funny, sad, and spiritually moving rings true. But Lost in Translation‘s othering of Japan too often crosses into racism and xenophobia, which makes it much less of a movie than it could be.
Bob and Charlotte say goodbye.
I would love to see a Before Sunset type follow-up to this film, to revisit Charlotte and Bob and see what might come of a second meeting between their characters, but also to give us a new take on the experience of being in an unfamiliar location. A more nuanced take reflecting the advancing maturity of the characters and of Sofia Coppola, crafting a better film that’s not only enjoyable with privileged blinders on.

Robin Hitchcock is an American writer living in Cape Town who usually wears pants when she stares out her window to gaze wistfully upon the city. 

To Romance Film Casting Directors: Without Further Ado–Hire Lucy Liu

Lucy Liu is dying to show off her comedic chops in the romance department.

“People see Julia Roberts and Sandra Bullock in a romantic film, but not me,” speaks Lucy Liu, frankly voicing an issue that refuses to die in Hollywood.
While Roberts and Bullock don’t dominate romantic comedy genre as they did in the nineties, their heavyweight torches have been passed down to Reese Witherspoon, Kate Hudson, and Emma Stone–actresses who can easily score roles without directors questioning color lines.

 Ally McBeal creator David E. Kelley wrote Ling Woo specifically for Lucy Liu. 
In Net-A-Porter’s Graphic Issue, Liu implores intimate details about racism.
As an educated, finely trained artist, Emmy-nominated Liu is right to wonder why her roster mainly consists of playing the stereotypical emotionless Asian (Ally McBeal’s Ling Woo) or the kick butt martial arts diva (Alex Munday in Charlie’s Angels and O-Ren Ishii in Kill Bill V.I & II). She deserves better.
Well, at least there is one joy to celebrate. 

Dr. Joan Watson (Lucy Liu) and Sherlock Holmes (Johnny Lee Miller) are renewed for a second helping of eclectic crime solving this fall.
Liu just wrapped up the freshman season of CBS’s hit Elementary, an intriguing television series drama adaptation of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s classic–Sherlock Holmes. Out of London and into modern day New York City, Holmes is a former drug addict residing with live-in sober companion and ex-surgeon Dr. Joan Watson–typically a male character named John. That’s wherein lies the exciting twist–a part Liu was born to play. 
Those boycotting Elementary due to Liu’s Asian background are missing out on an entertaining spin on history and a gracious opportunity rarely given to Liu. Holmes and Watson have a quirky charismatic relationship filled with warm humor, spontaneity, and charm, but I personally don’t want them to become more than that. Shows like Castle and Bones have their two leads together, and it would be a nice stretch if male and female relationships could stay strictly platonic and professional despite close quarters.
However, Liu deserves to be a female lead in a romantic comedy. She has terrific comedic timing (a huge plus, right?), irresistible chemistry with many male co-stars, and showcases a range of emotions.

More than the girl next door in Lucky Number Slevin, Lindsey is one of Lucy Liu’s favorite roles to date.
“I was thinking that if you’re still alive when I get back from work tonight… maybe we could go out to dinner or something?”
Liu’s delivery of the above line is expressed in such sweet precision in my recent discovery Lucky Number Slevin. She plays a witty sleuth of a coroner named Lindsey. Like Dr. Joan Watson, as the primary female presence in the male dominated cast, ethnicity isn’t focused on in this enigmatic action-packed thriller. From bloodthirsty beginning to grisly end, it proves to be no romantic comedy, but Liu is so charming, refreshing, and intelligent in her scene-stealing capabilities that one wishes that it was. Although Lindsey’s story isn’t as fully fleshed out as the male lead’s, in every affectionate laugh and soft smile, Liu shines bright from pigeonholed prison.

Alex Munday (Lucy Liu) in Charlie’s Angels.
Now if Elementary and Lucky Number Slevin both tap into Liu’s versatile potential, shouldn’t other casting agencies take note?
Despite Hollywood still being controlled by white men’s dominance, romantic comedies should give equal chance to the one who fits the role regardless of race. I have read articles where directors want Anne Hathaway or the next big non-ethnic actress for an audition, but no one asks for Lucy Liu or any other minority actress. Isn’t the primary importance of a romantic comedy to center on an adoring female lead who can seduce the audience with captivation and humor? Why must we continue cheering on the same type of woman when others desire the same role?
Liu proves that she can handle acting as both a love interest and a strong, fiercely independent woman. Often valiantly fighting to continue breaking role barriers, Liu’s ambition alone should drive considerable notice.

O-Ren Ishii (Lucy Liu) is ready for battle dressed in her lily white kimono.
“It’s really taking a while,” Liu states. “But I do think it’s becoming more acceptable to cast Asians in roles that weren’t originally slated for someone who is Asian, which is so great.”
That is true, especially in Liu’s case.
Yet as much as women desire very well-written romantic comedies and comforting “chick flicks,” we’re getting impatient with waiting for Liu’s turn on the merry-go-round.
C’mon. It is about time to let her be the star for once, Hollywood.

Fight to See Yourself On Screen

This is a guest post by Joyce Wu.

I’ve always loved movies. When I was a kid, nothing brought me greater pleasure than walking across those sticky floors to find the perfect seat, the scent of stale popcorn hanging in the air. My dad, my big brother, and I would always share a box of Sour Patch Kids. I loved spending those two hours inside the theater on thrilling adventures, falling in love, traveling to exotic locales, suffering terrible tragedies.

But Asian Americans didn’t seem to go on these adventures; they didn’t seem to fall in love; they didn’t travel to exotic locales. If anything, they were merely set decoration when the real protagonists of the stories got to those places. People of Asian descent didn’t seem to exist on screen at all, and when they did appear, bucktoothed and bumbling, their fleeting presence filled me with a burning shame, as if watching a family member humiliate himself in front of someone I was trying to impress.

When you hardly ever see anyone who looks like you on screen, and when the only people who look like you don’t seem like people at all, you begin to have a very limited notion of your own possibilities. This nagging insecurity I’ve lived with my whole life (and truthfully, what will always be a part of me and what drives my work) was nagging particularly loudly a few weeks ago.

Still from Screaming in Asian

I was at CAAMfest, an Asian American film festival in San Francisco. For the last two years, I’ve been trying to raise the money to make my first feature film, The Real Mikado, a comedy about an out-of-work Asian American actress who moves back in with her parents and directs a production of Gilbert & Sullivan’s opera The Mikado to try and save the community theater. I was at the festival to sceen the first ten minutes of the film as a short and to pitch the feature for the chance at a grant.

The day before the pitch, all of the filmmakers did a practice run-through of the event, and I was the last to present. I saw these passionate, talented people pitch their films about victims of war and impoverished children, and when it was my turn, I couldn’t find my words. All I could think was, “Why should anyone care about me or my stupid movie?” After years of struggling, I was so exhausted from pretending to be far more confident than I really was and so frustrated and hurt by the constant rejection that it all finally got to me.

Still from Screaming in Asian

I did the one thing that a woman who wants to be taken seriously is never supposed to do. I cried. I couldn’t even hold it together long enough to wait until I was in the privacy of a bathroom stall. I did it in front of everyone. Fortunately, the other filmmakers were incredibly supportive. Some of them cried too. That night, I stayed up all night revising and rehearsing my pitch. I stood in front of a mirror staring into my own bloodshot eyes and tried to convince myself that my movie was worth making.

The next morning, on about two hours of sleep, I walked up to the podium and told a panel of judges and an audience of about 70 people about The Real Mikado. I summoned everything I had from the deepest places of my soul and gave those people everything I could about who I am and why my film needs to be made. I killed it. I did as well as I possibly could have.

Short film teaser for The Real Mikado

Even though I gave it my all, I didn’t win the grant (that went to a wonderful documentary), but when I finished, a throng of young women from the Center for Asian American Media student delegate program came up to me and told me how excited they were about my film. They asked to take pictures with me and for advice on how to be an actor and whether or not I would watch their videos on YouTube and give feedback. One of them exclaimed, “Everything you said is what I feel!”

I had been feeling so defeated and so trivial that I failed to remember how powerful movies can be in shaping a person’s imagination and sense of self. These young women are yearning for the same thing I did and do: they want to see themselves as protagonists in their own stories; they want to go into a theater and see themselves.

Maybe this is too simple or wide-sweeping a generalization about white male privilege, but I doubt that Wes Anderson or Noah Baumbach ever wondered if their stories deserved to be told. The fact that I was filled with so much self-doubt speaks to a vicious cycle we’re all in, and we need to work together to stop it. How can we expect young girls (especially those of color) to grow up with enough confidence to be filmmakers when everything they watch is telling them that they are not valuable and that their stories don’t matter?

My film, like a lot of first features, is a personal one. It’s a little embarrassing to admit that I’m acting in and directing a movie that I wrote based on my own life. It feels more than a little self-involved to put myself on screen for all the world to see. But I realized a long time ago that if I don’t do it, no one else will.

Joyce Wu grew up outside of Detroit. Her short films have screened at festivals around the world. She was awarded a full-tuition scholarship to attend New York University’s prestigious graduate film program, where she completed her course work and is in pre-production on her first feature film, The Real Mikado. To find out more about the film, please visit: http://www.seedandspark.com/studio/real-mikado.

 

Women of Color in Film and TV: So, is there a racial bias on ‘The Good Wife’?

The Good Wife

Guest post written by Melanie Wanga.

In the crowded market of American television, one would suggests that The Good Wife is one of the most feminist shows out there. 
First, the main character is a woman. But not any woman: complex, strong-willed and hard-working Alicia Florrick (Julianna Margulies), whose husband Peter, state’s attorney, cheated very publicly with a prostitute. Despite its title, The Good Wife is not a soap about how love conquers all: rather, it’s the story of Alicia’s emancipation. 
The qualities of TGW are plenty: it’s intelligent, complex, thoughtful but packed with explosive twists and turns. The legal stories are well written and more importantly, the casting is premium. 
Actually, the acting ensemble is one of the strong suits of the show: actors like Alan Cumming (Eli Gold) or Christine Baranski (Diane Lockhart) are impressive and play wonderful their parts, when equally gifted actors regularly guest star in complex roles (Michael J. Fox, Matthew Perry…) 
If we agree on the notion that “feminism is the radical notion that women are people,” then The Good Wife is definitely feminist. Women of the show are deeply human, flawed, and developed. 
Which is a quite explosive fact in a legal drama, a genre usually crippled by stereotyped non-emotional lawyer-type characters. 
The Good Wife doesn’t hide behind tricks or facilities: the same complexity applies to all the characters. We are even treated with character development of women and men of color, and the show doesn’t shy away from race issues. 
If the women are strongly written, women of color sadly don’t escape stereotypical representations: Latinas are ‘fiery,’ and most often than not Black women are depicted as ‘angry.’ 
In honor of Black History month, I’d like to focus on the portrayals and specifics of the four most important women of color on the show: Kalinda Sharma (Archie Panjabi), Dana Lodge (Monica Raymund), Geneva Pine (Renee Goldsberry) and Wendy Scott-Carr (Anika Noni Rose). 
————————– 
Archie Panjabi as Kalinda Sharma

KALINDA SHARMA (Archie Panjabi) 

When you think ‘women of color in The Good Wife‘, the obvious answer is Kalinda Sharma. Interpreted by actress Archie Panjabi, who received an Emmy Award for her performance, she’s one of the most important characters on the show, and a viewers’ favorite. 
As an Investigator for Lockhart & Gardner, Kalinda exhudes confidence, intelligence … and sex. She often uses her physical traits and sexuality to obtain crucial information. Every character seems to succumb to her charms. 
Panjabi said in an interview that the character was not very defined at first, and simply based on an “Erin Brockovich investigator” type. That’s why I would argue Kalinda wasn’t specifically written as a woman of color. No reference is made to her social and ethnic backgrounds. Even after four seasons of the show, we still don’t know much more about her ethnicity. We are left with an “ambiguously brown” character. 
A huge part of Kalinda’s characterization lies in her sexuality. Extremely secretive and mysterious, she’s defined as bisexual (“I’m not gay. I’m… flexible,” she says), but she falls in the “not too bi” trope as she’s in fact slept with more men than women. She was even married to one [spoiler] (who  comes back in her life in the most disastrous storyline of the series). A good portion of the characters have been seduced by the investigator: Peter, Dana Lodge, FBI agent Lana Delaney… She also has an ongoing “will they/won’t they” affair with young lawyer Cary Agos (Matt Chruzcy). And, her boss Will Gardner aside, it’s made very clear that every man on the show is attracted to her. 
When Kalinda is seen in the company of other women, like Lana or Dana, the show quickly remembers us with frequent close-ups of her usual attire (namely, low-cut tops and knee-high boots) that “even the guys want her.” Kalinda’s sexuality pleases the male gaze. 
One of her main psychological traits is her duality: behind her apparent calm, cold and detached aspects (‘the submissive exotic girl’), she can become violent and extreme if the situation calls for it, which is another sexual cliché. She’s not apologetic about her sexual behavior, unless it concerns Alicia (another one of her limits). 
The fact is, as viewers, we know a lot about Kalinda’s sexuality. But we know oddly less about her motivations or internal dilemmas. Which sometimes gives the impression that her complexity is only apparent. That her “mystery” is factice, a ploy to serve the story. It’s clear the writers didn’t want to define Kalinda by her race or ethnicity, so they defined her by her sexuality and non-conventional work ethic. 
But is writing women of color as if they weren’t minorities at all is making them more real? I’m pretty sure not. 
——— 
Monica Raymund as Dana Lodge

DANA LODGE (Monica Raymund) 

Dana is an assistant at Peter’s office. She enters the show on season 2 and starts to work alongside Cary Ago. In many aspects, she fits very well the Latina’s trope: she’s fiery and out-spoken, throws tantrums, and is guided by her emotions — particularly her jealousy. 
This psychological trait is even more prominent when she interacts with Kalinda, and viewers learn the two are ex casual-sex friends. 
Working with Cary (who, as it’s been said on the show, has “a thing for ethnic women”), Dana is entangled in a love triangle with him and … Kalinda. 
Her sexuality is a heavily shown trait. But when Kalinda uses sex to her advantage, Dana is used at her own expense. She has a relationship with Cary, but he stills pines for Kalinda. And when Kalinda flirts with her, it’s for inside information. 
Dana Lodge is blindsided by her own emotions: she can’t see that Kalinda’s using her, nor that Cary’s not really attached to her. The character shows strong feelings and speaks them loudly, but can’t see through them. 
In her final scene on the show, Dana slaps Kalinda on the face, demonstrating once more her ‘fiery’ temper. At the end, Dana loses her job AND Cary. 
——— 
Renee Goldsberry as Geneva Pine

GENEVA PINE (Renee Goldsberry) 

In season 4, Peter Florrick, Chicago’s state’s attorney, runs for governor. There’s plenty of discussion on how he leads his office. Rumors of racial bias are floating around and are used by his political enemies. In one telling scene, Florrick asks his black assistant Geneva Pine if she thinks he has such bias. When she answers yes, a typical response is offered to her: rather than trying to understand her position, Florrick declares she’s wrong and misunderstood his intentions.  But then, she shuts up and judgmentally looks at him. Interestingly enough, he finally listens to her main argument on why he is racially biased: he systematically promotes white males first. 
This is an accurate depiction of most racial conversations in real life: I can’t count the times I’ve heard white people, when confronted with examples of racist or problematic behavior, respond: “But no, let me explain, it’s not racist. I’M not racist.” Resenting the idea of racism itself is more important than listening to the minority’s experience of it. 
However, Geneva is by no means a positive character. She’s talented and driven, but she’s ‘that’ minority character written as resentful over other people victories and accomplishments. 
When Cary worked at the state’s attorney’s office, she never took him seriously, even when she was teaming up with him. 
Geneva acts as an obstacle to other people ambitions, but she can’t stop them. While she’s not sexualized as a Black woman, she’s showed as perpetually angry, bitter and judgmental. 
The fact that Geneva often plays the ‘race card’ and is conscious of her status of woman of color is not welcomed positively on the show. Geneva is misguided, she accuses everyone of being biased. As such, she’s the stereotype of the ‘angry minority’ and ‘angry black woman’ who nobody listens to, because she’s ‘crazy, hateful and not neutral.’

Not a good look, huh? 

——— 
Anika Noni Rose as Wendy Scott-Carr

WENDY SCOTT-CARR (Anika Noni Rose) 

The fourth notable woman of color of the show is an interesting one as she holds much more power than the others. 
Wendy Scott Carr is introduced during the second season, when Peter decides to run for a new mandate state’s attorney. She positions herself as his political opponent. The fact that she’s a woman of color is precisely what gives her an edge: Peter’s sex scandal is still out there, and Wendy appears as a voice of the women. She’s everything he’s not: she’s Black and has strong family values. Even the viewers are rooting for her. She should crush Peter on the finish line. 
But then, the show develops the character. Wendy reveals herself to be ‘a bitch in sheep’s clothing:’ she’s cold, calculating and deeply hypocritical. Behind her nice facade, she’s smug, has unapologetic ambitions, and despises the Florricks. And she won’t hesitate to get dirty to win the election. 
When she loses the campaign to Peter, she takes her failure very personally. She then becomes a full-fledged resident villain of the show: on numerous occasions, she’ll be back to legally torment our protagonists. 
Wendy is not affable, that’s a fact. What’s bugging me is the show depicts Wendy’s coldness as more reprehensible than Peter’s amorality, and as a valid reason for her to lose. 
Developing a seemingly good character into a complex and ‘not so nice’ one is something The Good Wife does very well. In Wendy Scott-Carr’s case, the evolution seemed forced, and to make her come back for Will’s blood on season 3 was downright caricature. She’s not nuanced anymore: she hates Alicia, the Florricks, the Lockhart-Gardner law firm and all of their allies. She will go after our heroes for no other reason than … well, she REALLY hates them. 
As much as it’s rare (and nice) to see an ambitious Black woman with actual power on TV, the traits that seem to prevail are always anger, grudge, man-hating. As if they somehow should make people pay. 
——— 
Women of color in The Good Wife seem to follow a strange pattern. The good side: they’re all ambitious and talented. The bad side: they’re either sexualized, thus deemed attractive and complex, or they become jealous, angry and over-the-top villains. 
Representing complex women of color in millennial television shouldn’t be a challenge. But, by all accounts  it still is. While I applaud The Good Wife for depicting ambitious and complex characters, I can’t hide my disappointment over stereotypical traits in their women of color. 
Seriously, I love my TV shows and all. But, really writers, I can assure you we, and by we I mean humanity, don’t need MORE representations of fiery Latinas and angry Black women. 
——— 
Melanie Wanga is a French journalist based in Paris. She’s a pop culture lover, passionate reader and a feminist. Like everybody on the Internet, she also loves cats. You can follow her on Twitter: @MelanieWanga.

Women of Color in Film and TV: So, is there a racial bias on ‘The Good Wife?’

The Good Wife

Guest post written by Melanie Wanga.

In the crowded market of American television, one would suggests that The Good Wife is one of the most feminist shows out there. 
First, the main character is a woman. But not any woman: complex, strong-willed and hard-working Alicia Florrick (Julianna Margulies), whose husband Peter, state’s attorney, cheated very publicly with a prostitute. Despite its title, The Good Wife is not a soap about how love conquers all: rather, it’s the story of Alicia’s emancipation. 
The qualities of TGW are plenty: it’s intelligent, complex, thoughtful but packed with explosive twists and turns. The legal stories are well written and more importantly, the casting is premium. 
Actually, the acting ensemble is one of the strong suits of the show: actors like Alan Cumming (Eli Gold) or Christine Baranski (Diane Lockhart) are impressive and play wonderful their parts, when equally gifted actors regularly guest star in complex roles (Michael J. Fox, Matthew Perry…) 
If we agree on the notion that “feminism is the radical notion that women are people,” then The Good Wife is definitely feminist. Women of the show are deeply human, flawed, and developed. 
Which is a quite explosive fact in a legal drama, a genre usually crippled by stereotyped non-emotional lawyer-type characters. 
The Good Wife doesn’t hide behind tricks or facilities: the same complexity applies to all the characters. We are even treated with character development of women and men of color, and the show doesn’t shy away from race issues. 
If the women are strongly written, women of color sadly don’t escape stereotypical representations: Latinas are ‘fiery,’ and most often than not Black women are depicted as ‘angry.’ 
In honor of Black History month, I’d like to focus on the portrayals and specifics of the four most important women of color on the show: Kalinda Sharma (Archie Panjabi), Dana Lodge (Monica Raymund), Geneva Pine (Renee Goldsberry) and Wendy Scott-Carr (Anika Noni Rose). 
————————– 
Archie Panjabi as Kalinda Sharma

KALINDA SHARMA (Archie Panjabi) 

When you think ‘women of color in The Good Wife‘, the obvious answer is Kalinda Sharma. Interpreted by actress Archie Panjabi, who received an Emmy Award for her performance, she’s one of the most important characters on the show, and a viewers’ favorite. 
As an Investigator for Lockhart & Gardner, Kalinda exhudes confidence, intelligence … and sex. She often uses her physical traits and sexuality to obtain crucial information. Every character seems to succumb to her charms. 
Panjabi said in an interview that the character was not very defined at first, and simply based on an “Erin Brockovich investigator” type. That’s why I would argue Kalinda wasn’t specifically written as a woman of color. No reference is made to her social and ethnic backgrounds. Even after four seasons of the show, we still don’t know much more about her ethnicity. We are left with an “ambiguously brown” character. 
A huge part of Kalinda’s characterization lies in her sexuality. Extremely secretive and mysterious, she’s defined as bisexual (“I’m not gay. I’m… flexible,” she says), but she falls in the “not too bi” trope as she’s in fact slept with more men than women. She was even married to one [spoiler] (who  comes back in her life in the most disastrous storyline of the series). A good portion of the characters have been seduced by the investigator: Peter, Dana Lodge, FBI agent Lana Delaney… She also has an ongoing “will they/won’t they” affair with young lawyer Cary Agos (Matt Chruzcy). And, her boss Will Gardner aside, it’s made very clear that every man on the show is attracted to her. 
When Kalinda is seen in the company of other women, like Lana or Dana, the show quickly remembers us with frequent close-ups of her usual attire (namely, low-cut tops and knee-high boots) that “even the guys want her.” Kalinda’s sexuality pleases the male gaze. 
One of her main psychological traits is her duality: behind her apparent calm, cold and detached aspects (‘the submissive exotic girl’), she can become violent and extreme if the situation calls for it, which is another sexual cliché. She’s not apologetic about her sexual behavior, unless it concerns Alicia (another one of her limits). 
The fact is, as viewers, we know a lot about Kalinda’s sexuality. But we know oddly less about her motivations or internal dilemmas. Which sometimes gives the impression that her complexity is only apparent. That her “mystery” is factice, a ploy to serve the story. It’s clear the writers didn’t want to define Kalinda by her race or ethnicity, so they defined her by her sexuality and non-conventional work ethic. 
But is writing women of color as if they weren’t minorities at all is making them more real? I’m pretty sure not. 
——— 
Monica Raymund as Dana Lodge

DANA LODGE (Monica Raymund) 

Dana is an assistant at Peter’s office. She enters the show on season 2 and starts to work alongside Cary Ago. In many aspects, she fits very well the Latina’s trope: she’s fiery and out-spoken, throws tantrums, and is guided by her emotions — particularly her jealousy. 
This psychological trait is even more prominent when she interacts with Kalinda, and viewers learn the two are ex casual-sex friends. 
Working with Cary (who, as it’s been said on the show, has “a thing for ethnic women”), Dana is entangled in a love triangle with him and … Kalinda. 
Her sexuality is a heavily shown trait. But when Kalinda uses sex to her advantage, Dana is used at her own expense. She has a relationship with Cary, but he stills pines for Kalinda. And when Kalinda flirts with her, it’s for inside information. 
Dana Lodge is blindsided by her own emotions: she can’t see that Kalinda’s using her, nor that Cary’s not really attached to her. The character shows strong feelings and speaks them loudly, but can’t see through them. 
In her final scene on the show, Dana slaps Kalinda on the face, demonstrating once more her ‘fiery’ temper. At the end, Dana loses her job AND Cary. 
——— 
Renee Goldsberry as Geneva Pine

GENEVA PINE (Renee Goldsberry) 

In season 4, Peter Florrick, Chicago’s state’s attorney, runs for governor. There’s plenty of discussion on how he leads his office. Rumors of racial bias are floating around and are used by his political enemies. In one telling scene, Florrick asks his black assistant Geneva Pine if she thinks he has such bias. When she answers yes, a typical response is offered to her: rather than trying to understand her position, Florrick declares she’s wrong and misunderstood his intentions.  But then, she shuts up and judgmentally looks at him. Interestingly enough, he finally listens to her main argument on why he is racially biased: he systematically promotes white males first. 
This is an accurate depiction of most racial conversations in real life: I can’t count the times I’ve heard white people, when confronted with examples of racist or problematic behavior, respond: “But no, let me explain, it’s not racist. I’M not racist.” Resenting the idea of racism itself is more important than listening to the minority’s experience of it. 
However, Geneva is by no means a positive character. She’s talented and driven, but she’s ‘that’ minority character written as resentful over other people victories and accomplishments. 
When Cary worked at the state’s attorney’s office, she never took him seriously, even when she was teaming up with him. 
Geneva acts as an obstacle to other people ambitions, but she can’t stop them. While she’s not sexualized as a Black woman, she’s showed as perpetually angry, bitter and judgmental. 
The fact that Geneva often plays the ‘race card’ and is conscious of her status of woman of color is not welcomed positively on the show. Geneva is misguided, she accuses everyone of being biased. As such, she’s the stereotype of the ‘angry minority’ and ‘angry black woman’ who nobody listens to, because she’s ‘crazy, hateful and not neutral.’

Not a good look, huh? 

——— 
Anika Noni Rose as Wendy Scott-Carr

WENDY SCOTT-CARR (Anika Noni Rose) 

The fourth notable woman of color of the show is an interesting one as she holds much more power than the others. 
Wendy Scott Carr is introduced during the second season, when Peter decides to run for a new mandate state’s attorney. She positions herself as his political opponent. The fact that she’s a woman of color is precisely what gives her an edge: Peter’s sex scandal is still out there, and Wendy appears as a voice of the women. She’s everything he’s not: she’s Black and has strong family values. Even the viewers are rooting for her. She should crush Peter on the finish line. 
But then, the show develops the character. Wendy reveals herself to be ‘a bitch in sheep’s clothing:’ she’s cold, calculating and deeply hypocritical. Behind her nice facade, she’s smug, has unapologetic ambitions, and despises the Florricks. And she won’t hesitate to get dirty to win the election. 
When she loses the campaign to Peter, she takes her failure very personally. She then becomes a full-fledged resident villain of the show: on numerous occasions, she’ll be back to legally torment our protagonists. 
Wendy is not affable, that’s a fact. What’s bugging me is the show depicts Wendy’s coldness as more reprehensible than Peter’s amorality, and as a valid reason for her to lose. 
Developing a seemingly good character into a complex and ‘not so nice’ one is something The Good Wife does very well. In Wendy Scott-Carr’s case, the evolution seemed forced, and to make her come back for Will’s blood on season 3 was downright caricature. She’s not nuanced anymore: she hates Alicia, the Florricks, the Lockhart-Gardner law firm and all of their allies. She will go after our heroes for no other reason than … well, she REALLY hates them. 
As much as it’s rare (and nice) to see an ambitious Black woman with actual power on TV, the traits that seem to prevail are always anger, grudge, man-hating. As if they somehow should make people pay. 
——— 
Women of color in The Good Wife seem to follow a strange pattern. The good side: they’re all ambitious and talented. The bad side: they’re either sexualized, thus deemed attractive and complex, or they become jealous, angry and over-the-top villains. 
Representing complex women of color in millennial television shouldn’t be a challenge. But, by all accounts  it still is. While I applaud The Good Wife for depicting ambitious and complex characters, I can’t hide my disappointment over stereotypical traits in their women of color. 
Seriously, I love my TV shows and all. But, really writers, I can assure you we, and by we I mean humanity, don’t need MORE representations of fiery Latinas and angry Black women. 
——— 
Melanie Wanga is a French journalist based in Paris. She’s a pop culture lover, passionate reader and a feminist. Like everybody on the Internet, she also loves cats. You can follow her on Twitter: @MelanieWanga.