Part
of my intention when I began Films for the Trump Years was to provide
something of a beginner’s guide to films of all ages and stripes that, in some
way, dealt with themes that reflect or comment on the many issues we are
currently facing at this particular fulcrum of human history (both
Trump-related and non). The easy way to
do this would be for me to stick to historical dramas or documentaries that
explicitly tackle the direct, real-world causes of this current wave of
reactionary conservatism. And indeed,
that is mostly what I spent 2017 doing.
This
was with good reason- all the films I’ve picked are excellent, must-see works-
but going forward I’d like to at least occasionally branch out a bit and think
a bit bigger about how we relate to storytelling, and how we can use
storytelling as inspiration for real-world change. With that in mind, for this month’s
installment I am suggesting a double-feature that might sound rather odd, at
least at first; the 2010 indie drama Winter’s
Bone, and last year’s Best Picture Winner, Moonlight (2016).
Winter’s Bone is a 2010 indie drama
written by Anne Rosellini and Debra Granik (who also directed), and starring
Jennifer Lawrence in the role that put her on the cinematic map. She plays Ree, a teenager living in a
dejectedly poor stretch of the Ozark Mountains.
With a no-show father connected to the area’s extensive methamphetamine
underworld and a mentally ill mother, she’s had to grow up fast and basically
be the lone providing parent for her two younger siblings. What scraps the family has are suddenly
threatened when the local sheriff shows up and informs her that her Dad failed
to show for a court date, and had previously signed over the family house as
collateral, meaning that if he doesn’t show soon (or if Ree can’t provide proof
he’s dead), the state will be forced to collect, and she and her family will
essentially be made homeless. Left
trying to navigate (and survive) a world built on family loyalty and absolute
silence, she proceeds to fight tooth and nail against the grain of her
community so as to find out the truth.
Moonlight, written and directed by Barry
Jenkins, came out in 2016, and eventually won three Academy Awards, including
Best Picture in possibly the strangest moment in Oscar history. Divided into three parts, we see different
stages of the life of a black man named Chiron, first as a small child, then as
a teenager, and finally as an adult. The
film is, at least primarily, about Chiron’s lifelong struggles to understand
and accept his homosexuality. It goes
far beyond that, however, in its meditations on racism, toxic masculinity,
cultures of drug abuse and prostitution, and the dynamics of broken families,
and how each of these things contribute to making his journey of
self-acceptance that much harder and more painful.
On
the face of it, these movies may seem to be complete polar opposites; one is
about a white woman in one of the most homogenously white parts of rural America,
and the other is about a black man in one of the most ethnically diverse coastal
cities in America (Miami). And yet, the
more I’ve thought about these two movies, the more similarities I see between
the two main characters. Both are
struggling to achieve some form of material or emotional peace amidst worlds of
depravation and violence. Both are stuck
in cycles of deep poverty, which inform the life choices they end up making
about how to live. For Ree, one of the
only viable options open to her to make a decent salary is to join the military,
where her life would be completely in the hands of higher-ups who literally can’t
imagine what she’s gone through. Chiron
comes from a world suffused with drug use, and we eventually learn that,
through either choice or circumstance, he ends up in the same boat as an adult,
selling the very drugs that wrecked his mother’s health years earlier.
Even
the respective obstacles they are forced to deal with are remarkably
similar. In addition to the limitations
of poverty they face, both push against gender and sexual restrictions latent
in society about how they each “should” behave.
Both worlds are filled with men, young and old, who exemplify various
forms of toxic masculinity. Ree is told
perfunctorily by the men (and the women!) around her to just drop it, to stop
asking awkward questions about her Dad, to just shut up and let things be. Chiron is tormented by other kids at an early
age for being a “faggot,” with even his own mother criticizing the way he walks. He is provided some fatherly support and
advice by Juan, but for all his wisdom, he’s every bit as trapped as Chiron by
the environment he’s grown up in. None
of the men in these movies, for all of the swagger they possess, are in places
of real security or happiness.
And
though neither film focuses on racism, at least consciously, it’s worth viewing
them a second time deliberately through the lens of this country’s racial
history. Look at the ethnically
homogenous world Ree is from and ask yourselves; why, exactly, is this part of
the country so white? How would these
characters react if a Trump-like figure came marching through, proclaiming his
solidarity with their pain and an end to the dominance of those terrible city elites
who scoff at their poverty and laugh at their silly accents?
Similarly,
what are the racial dynamics in our history that led to Chiron’s community in
Miami being so cut off, poorly-served, and plagued by drugs and crime? How does the film’s treatment of this sort of
environment comment on our broader history of explicitly shunting minorities
into poor neighbors and promoting drug use there? What can Chiron’s life tell us about the
prison industrial complex? What would it
take to rectify all this pain, all this suffering, all this psychological
scarring?
Part
of the challenge we now collectively face, if we can summon the courage to
really deal with it, is to finally own up to difficult, painful questions that
need to be asked, again and again, questions that are without simple
solutions. Both of these amazing films
allow us to do that, which is why, this month, I recommend watching each of
these movies side by side, if you haven’t seen them already, and allowing yourself
to ponder the questions they raised, and whether or not we can finally offer
some answers to them.
-Noah Franc
Previously on Films for the Trump Years:
Part 1- Selma
Part 2- Good Night, and Good Luck
Part 3- 13th
Part 4- Get Out
Part 5- Chasing Ice/Chasing Coral
Part 6- The Big Short
Part 7- Human Flow
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