Quote:
Originally Posted by lovelyivy84
Even my very white boyfriend who HAS been a teacher in an inner city school (along with other white people, black people and even hispanic and asian people, wow!) turned to me when he saw the trailer for this and was like "they're making this movie again?"
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There was an excellent op-ed in the Guardian (UK) newspaper about the whole "white crusaders/brown savages" theme that runs through Hollywood films. It was written about
Blood Diamond, but also touches on films like
The Interpreter,
The Constant Gardener,
Glory, and
To Kill a Mockingbird:
http://film.guardian.co.uk/features/...982608,00.html
From the article:
Pioneeringly foolish, To Kill a Mockingbird establishes the basic theme of all Three Cheers for Whitey! movies: Yes, there are many bad white people out there who do some terrible, terrible things to black people. But when the chips are down and black people are poised on the very precipice of disaster, they can always rely on some thoroughly decent white folks to step in and make sure that justice prevails.
The only movie where there was a white teacher (protagonist) who played against a black student that came off feeling somewhat genuine was
Half Nelson with Ryan Gosling and Shameeka Epps. If you haven't seen it, rent it.