FILM REVIEW: FOR COLORED GIRLS WHO HAVE CONSIDERED SUICIDE

A scene from For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide/When the Rainbow Is Enuf.

Shades of life

By Aja Davis

In Ntozake Shange's For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide/When the Rainbow Is Enuf seven African-American dancers, all dressed in a different color, alternate their roles in the spotlight, maintaining a driving support system, a shoulder to lean on for one another. All the women are going through life altering experiences, some of which are very prevalent today. Shange’s goal was to reach audiences with these issues especially in the African-American community. There is no question that writer-director Tyler Perry executed this very well. Each actor was chosen to play out a scene, whether large or small and did it as if it was their own very real life. Everyone stroked a cord with every emotion. The acting is far from what we are use to seeing with Perry’s plays. Loyal Perry fans will appreciate that he used his trademark way of touching on moral issues but staying away from his over the top touches of humor.

Oscar worthy performances of the torn mother and daughter relationship between Thandie Newton’s sex addicted and Whoopi Goldberg’s over religious characters will not disappoint audiences. Macy Gray’s adaptation of a gritty back alley abortionist is a small cameo but will have young women think twice before having unprotected sex. Janet Jackson’s high powered character is knocked down from her high horse after receiving an unwanted gift from her husband. Kimberly Elise’s character has to deal with the struggles of supporting her family while dealing with abuse from her children’s father, a veteran left psychologically unfit after the war. These characters along with the others are all woman that many of us can relate to. You know all or some of these women, some of which are in your family, a friend, a co-worker, a boss or even a neighbor.

The only drawback that I saw with the movie was the editing. There were scenes that could have been drawn out more. You were left hanging on to the last word and then it cuts to a new scene. My mind often wondered, “What happened after that?” “I want to see more.” “Wait, go back!”


The movie wraps up with all of the women coming together and declaring that they will not let there terrible experiences defeat them. I can truly appreciate Perry for doing this film and bringing awareness to young and older woman today who may feel trapped and believe that there is no other way than suicide to end it all. I truly believe that this will motivate many to take control of her or his destiny.


















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FILM REVIEW: 12TH & DELAWARE

Little props for big decisions at 12th & Delaware.

Living with the lies

By Miranda Inganni

"That's what abortions are for, to stop unwanted pregnancies. And this is an unwanted pregnancy," -- A 24-year-old mother of two in 12th & Delaware.

Thirty-seven years after Roe v. Wade became the law of the land, anti-choice movements are more prevalent, with a woman's right to choose what she wants to do with her own body now under attack more than ever since the landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision. 

A perfect example of the warring reproductive rights conflict is the intersection at 12th Street and Delaware Avenue in Fort Pierce, Florida, where across the street from the A Woman's World abortion clinic resides a Pregnancy Care Center, an anti-choice outpost where unsuspecting women looking for abortion counseling and care meet people trying to convince you to keep the child. 

As the director of the Pregnancy Care Center, Anne C. Lotierzo -- a woman with no children of her own -- spends time counseling pregnant girls and women. Frequently using gruesome images, deceptive tactics and flat out lies (there is no link between abortion and breast cancer!), Lotierzo lays the anti-choice rhetoric on pretty think, but it's the free ultrasounds the center provides that are the most persuasive argument the center has for these girls and women to see their pregnancies through birth. When a woman sees an image(s) of her child's heart beating "Hi Mommy," a decision to abort the abortion sometimes becomes less difficult.

Across the street at A Woman's World, Candace Dye and her husband, Arnold, run the clinic, doing everything in their power to inform and protect their clients, as well as the doctors they shuttle to and fro the clinic. Shrouded in sheets, the doctors with whom Candace and Arnold work with are brought in at great risk to all involved.

Outside A Woman's World, the small, but mighty (or at least loud) crowd that seems to be constantly protesting the clinic, go to great lengths to make their intentions known. An old religious lady yells at everyone going inside A Woman's World. Then there is the group of young Latinos offering goods and money to young Latinas changing their mind. One misogynistic muscular male goes so far as to follow Arnold in yellow muscle car to the location where he and the doctor, who the protester refers to as "the killer," meet up, thereby putting that very doctor's anonymity and life at risk. "I know people," he warns.

It is abundantly clear that both groups are passionate about the work they do. The main difference is that Lotierzo comes across as a religious fanatic, hellbent on winning at any cost whereas Candace and Arnold seem truly concerned about the women they treat. Lotierzo gloats about her "successes" and prides herself on her modus operandi for convincing women, sometimes as young as 15 years old, to keep their unborn child. Over at A Woman's World, with no pressure and the facts in hand, Candace makes sure the needs of her patients are met. "Abortions are never wanted," Candace tells her patients.

Shot over two years and edited down to a tidy 80 minutes, co-directed by Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grad -- the team behind the Oscar-nominated documentary, Jesus Camp -- 12th & Delaware spends the majority of its time focusing on the Pregnancy Care Center and, true to form, their supporters who are both vocal and vigilant. For better or worse, A Woman's World receives far less attention.

Perhaps most surprisingly is that neither the center nor the clinic discusses adoption as an option. And that omission is indicative of how this HBO documentary fails to address an issue consuming much of America. (Europe is pretty much done discussing the validity of a woman's right to choose.) The documentary's narrative stresses the singlemindedness of and victory for each side and less about the the lives affected.

However, one thing remains perfectly clear at the end, with more than 4000 pro-life clinics and 816 abortion clinics in the United States, it's clear where America's money and mindset is blowing.

 

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FILM REVIEW: SPLICE

Elsa (Sarah Polley) and Clive (Adrian Brody) cannot toss baby out with the bathwater.

Sexy beast

By Don Simpson

Clive Nicoli (Adrien Brody) and Elsa Kast (Sarah Polley) are rock star scientists with serious god complexes who splice and dice the DNA of various animal species to genetically engineer unique hybrid beings. Their first major success story -- earning them the front cover of Wired -- occurs with the creation of two non-descript slimy blobs named Ginger and Fred. The sugar daddy for Clive and Elsa’s Dr. Frankenstein experiments is Newstead Pharmaceuticals. The towering black skyscrapers (one of countless references to David Cronenberg’s oeuvre) lend the pharma corporation a menacing and mysterious aura -- though they purport to be solely interested in saving humankind from disease, we know that they are only in it for the money.

The logical next evolutionary step in Clive and Elsa’s research is to toss some human DNA into the mix, but even Newstead hesitates to cross that moral/ethical/legal line. Now operating out of their very own N.E.R.D. (Nucleic Exchange Research and Development) labs, Clive and Elsa, still buzzing from the high of creating Ginger and Fred, just can’t stop themselves from conducting stealth experiments with human DNA during the off hours of their day job (extracting potentially beneficial enzymes, proteins and the like from Ginger and Fred for Newstead). Eventually, Clive and Elsa spawn a strange being with some human characteristics. The creature, named Dren (Abigail Chu / Delphine Chanéac), ages and matures quite rapidly and it is not long before Dren becomes an unmanageable child-figure for Clive and Elsa (they seem to make better gods than parents). Dren displays new and unexpected physical and mental developments on a daily basis, unraveling the genetic map inherited from her Petri dish of parents. An interesting treatise on what it means to become a female human, including the necessities of dresses, make-up, and Barbie dolls, Dren evolves quite literally into a fully matured seductress.

Vincenzo Natali (Cube) directed and co-wrote this cerebrally entrancing and disturbing mind-fuck of a film. Splice is prime fodder for engrossing moral and ethical debates on topics (some more taboo than others) such as: genetic inheritance, cloning, incest, bestiality, abortion, and parenthood (specifically control and punishment of children). Natali is much more interested in blowing the filmgoer’s mind than scaring them; there is more science fiction ancestry inherent in Splice than horror (the trailer seems to suggest otherwise). Flagrantly flashing his cinematic calling-cards (just as Clive sports t-shirts signifying genetic fingerprints and evolution), Natali splices the genes of Ridley Scott’s Alien with those of several David Cronenberg films all-the-while utilizing the story of Frankenstein as a narrative guide. Sure, parts of the story are highly derivative, but the resulting creation as a whole is fairly original; and lusciously lensed by one of my favorite cinematographers of late, Tetsuo Nagata (Micmacs, La vie en rose), Splice is a modestly produced marvel to behold.

Natali really pushes the limits of what filmgoers might be willing to watch (especially when it comes to incest and bestiality) and I have no doubt that some scenes will be way too much for unsuspecting viewers. There are several moments when it is unclear whether Natali expects us to be shocked or humored by the onscreen events; nonetheless, I found these scenes to be too chock full of meaning and significance to merely write them off as gratuitous. Besides, Splice more than likely represents our future (heck, there are probably some rogue scientists or maniacal pharma corporations already turning these fictions into fact) so we better start preparing ourselves now before an army of Drens inherits the earth.

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