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Text Review – Django Unchained – J.Ray

In Quentin Tarantino’s 2012 hit movie Django Unchained, the themes of identity, power, and injustice are clearly present issues throughout the entirety of the film. The film is situated just two years before the Civil War in which slavery and racial segregation was at an all-time high. The plotline itself centers around Django who was previously a slave. After being freed by German dentist and bounty hunter Dr. King Schultz, the pair begins their mission to hunt the most wanted criminals in the South, many of which are wealthy, racist, and white plantation owners.

This film addresses the issue of power through a variety of different dynamics. Foremost, power is addressed through the master vs. slave relationship. Throughout this movie, there are a variety of different characters and individuals involved in this master vs. slave dynamic. Since the protagonist of the movie, Django, was a former slave, the plotline obviously makes the audience sympathize with the slaves more than the masters, which in this case are often the plantation owners. Another obvious power dynamic exists within the racial segregation. Since this movie is depicting pre-Civil War America, there is an obvious unfair sharing of power between people of color and the white people. This notion and unfair balance of power is present within the entire movie and the resolution of the plot seemingly suggests that this unbalanced power sharing is immoral. Additionally, this film attempts to explore injustice through the display of the cruel ways in which the plantation owners treat their slaves. The whole role of Django and Dr. Schultz is to make the plantation owners face retribution for their actions and the harmful ways in which they have treated their slaves.

Overall, while Quentin Tarantino movies always seem to include just the right amount of action as well as overall interesting plot development, I think that Django Unchained attempts to really address identity, power, and injustice. I think his main purpose in the creation of this movie is to inspire individuals to fight for what is right and to stand up against injusticeDjango Unchained, Review | Den of Geek

 

Text Review —- Animal Farm —- Peijun Zhong

The book I want to choose to talk about is Animal Farm. It is a novella by British writer George Orwell, first published in 1945. In the novel, a group of animals on a farm successfully carry out a revolution to drive their human masters out of the farm and establish an egalitarian animal society. However, the animal leaders, the intelligent pigs, eventually usurp the fruits of the revolution and become more authoritarian and totalitarian rulers than their human masters. Through his own experience and his knowledge of the purges of the Soviet Union, Orwell developed a sense of the nature of the Soviet Union under Stalin. Animal Farm, like a fairy tale, was the result of this idea. 

The reason I want to talk about this book is that it has different levels of clashes in it. The first one is about the confrontations between human masters and oppressed animals. The second clash is between the animal in lead, which in the book is ruled by a pig, and the rest docile animals, which can not voice their opinion. Let us talk about the first one first, the human master ruled the animals and abused them, here Orwell referring to the capitalism oppressed working class. The second is the society those animals built. They claim to be socialists, they said: “ every animal is equal, but some animals are more equal to the other” which is very funny. And I notice that those who suffered, are those who choose to stay silent, it is not wrong that those animals defend themself when they are being oppressed, and they should holding to the believes that if the new leader did not give them a better life, they still, and always have the power to overthrow it again. The sulbaran will gain the power once they choose to stand out and speak for themselves because no one else will come to save them, they themselves are holding the power to save themselves from misery.

 

Citation

https://interestingliterature.com/2020/05/a-summary-and-analysis-of-george-orwells-animal-farm/ 

The Hate You Give N.Ferrara

The powerful movie The Hate You Give teaches lessons and touches upon important issues that can be seen in our everyday lives. This is a story about the fight for justice as an unarmed black teenager was shot and killed by police. Him and his friend Star were sitting in the car and got pulled over, as he reached for his hairbrush during the traffic stop the officer fired, shot and killed him. The story then goes on as Star fights for justice for her best friend and the hundred other African American men and women who are killed by police each year. She sets up protests and marches bringing attention to the systemic injustice embedded in the justice system and the unfair treatment of African American’s by police in America. 

This movie addresses the idea of identity because of the color of his skin. That was the driving factor for the police officer to shoot his weapon and a main argument of Star’s. If her friend was white, would the officer have felt inclined to shoot his gun? Next, power comes into play because of the power the justice system has during situations like this. The justice system is portrayed as all white, powerful men which is why the fight for justice in this situation and others similar is so difficult. These men have not felt the same injustices African American men have which is why when put in these positions of power, justice is hard to find. Finally, when looking at the injustice and the systemic injustice, it is simple and it is the justice system and how difficult it is for African American men and women to get justice. 

This connects directly to the book The March by John Lewis. This novel took place in 1965 and this movie was released in 2018. In the novel, he was protesting for equality, voting rights and justice for African American men and women. These athings were fought for for years and are still being fought for as we see the fight for justice and equality being shown in a movie released almost 50 years later. This movie can also connect to Can The Subaltern Speak? as in previous altercations and interactions with police people did not speak up. Because the justice system is so powerful there were nerves when it came to speaking up, placing the people being affected in the category of the subaltern. In this movie, it shows the opposite but only with Star at the beginning. She wanted to protest and break through the idea of being the subaltern but due to fear of the police her parents and peers did not want her to. She was silenced for months conformed to being the subaltern until she knew what she wanted to do was right and was able to speak up and use her voice. 

Text Review – 42 – J. DeSantis

42 is a movie that highlights the amazing career of the first Black professional baseball player, Jackie Robinson.  This movie focuses on the injustices Robinson went through being the first Black player in an all-white league.  This entire semester we have talked about injustice and this movie does a great job of showing how black people were treated back then.

This movie starts off with Jackie Robinson in an all-black baseball league.  He is substantially better than all of the other players, but there were separate leagues because black baseball players could not play with white baseball players.  A man by the name of Branch Rickey is bold enough to break down this barrier and send a scout to one of Robinson’s games to ask if he would want to move up to the big leagues.  Branch told Robinson that he has to be strong because he will get a lot of haste and backlash for being the first black player in an all-white league.  Robinson went on to get multiple death threats and even some of his teammates signed a petition to not play with him. This example of injustice stuck out to me the most because he was getting death threats in the mail just because he wanted to play baseball.  Like many other people in the black community, Robinson had to stay strong and deal with all of the injustice he was facing.  He even breakdown in the middle of a game because another team’s coach was harassing him.

I think this movie is a great example of how going against the social norm and ignoring racial injustice can make a big impact on the world.  Robinson was the first of many black baseball players to make it to the big leagues and it didn’t stop there.  Branch Rickey was bold enough to take Robinson into his program and made history by doing so.  Other than telling the story of the great Jackie Robinson, I this that the author was trying to show how far our society has come in terms of racial injustice.  We went from having baseball leagues separated by race to white males being the minority in the MLB.

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Text Review: Mulan – P. Keller

Many of us are familiar with Mulan, the Disney classic about a girl living under a patriarchal regime who secretly takes her father’s place in the Chinese military. Mulan escapes her fate of falling into the trap of what society thinks a perfect woman and daughter should be and redefines gender roles in her own terms.

In the town that Mulan comes from women are seen as worthy only if they are capable of being a good cook, always looking beautiful, and being obedient. The movie reinforces the prominence of masculinity throughout. One of the ways that Mulan demonstrates this idea is by only letting men go to fight. Not only does this demonstrate that men are the only powerful ones but even the men who are “girly“ have to be turned into real men by becoming strong and good fighters. During the scene where the men are training for war, the captain is sending the message that being womanly is not acceptable for a soldier. The song that is sung during this scene highlights the fact that men are the ones who must be strong and a force to be reckoned with in the war.

On the other hand, Mulan corrects this injustice by reinforcing the idea that being a woman does not create any setbacks, and being a woman in her town can mean so much more than being beautiful and obedient. She takes her father’s place, trains with the men, and ends up victorious showing that the stereotype that only strong men can go fight is irrelevant. Not only does Mulan become just as physically strong as the men, but it is also her wit and her mind that allows her to outperform the men. Mulan also does not have the typical Disney princess desire of having a man come to save her or dreaming of romance, instead, she goes out and fights for herself and her family.

Blue Bloods

Blue Bloods is a show about a family that lives in New York city and is heavily embedded into the justice system of New York. The father of the family is the current police commissioner, while his two sons serve in the NYPD. His daughter is also a very prominent attorney for the city. The show is fictional but has a very realistic feel as relates back to injustices we see today. This show does a very good job about talking about racial injustices in society and the relationship between minorities and police. 

In an episode during season 5 we follow along as Danny, the police commissioner’s son, chases a robbery suspect. The suspect ends up in an apartment complex and once he realizes that Danny has him cornered, he hurls himself through a 3rd floor window and breaks his leg. This then led to a massive riot, as the young man being chased was black and he claimed it was police brutality and they pushed him out of the window. These large riots were led by a black man by the name of Reverend Darnell Potter. There is a large push for the idea that the NYPD is bad and that Danny should be fired. We later find out that there was boy who saw the whole thing go down but he was scared to testify as his family moved to the US illegally. In the end he ends up testify and the truth comes out that the man jumped through the window and it had nothing to do with race or police brutality.  

To me this relates back to our posts about systemic injustices. This is because since there are instances where race caused discrimination, we just assume that to be true of every instance. In this case without the boy giving his testimony Danny would have had no proof that he did not shove the man out the window and would have been labeled as a racist that partook in police brutality. I believe this is injustice in our society as it can be used against people in certain cases like these. If Danny had not been able to prove his story his life would have also been ruined as he would have had to face legal punishment, lost his job and would never be accepted in society again. I believe that in today’s society we are quick to assume a racial injustice without looking at all of the facts. This seems to take credit away from the instances where a racial injustice is truly the case. 

 

Text Review- Race- Hadley LeVan

Race is a movie that highlights the life and racing career of one of our very own Ohio State Buckeyes, Jesse Owens. The movie focuses on many injustices that were present at the time, most notably racial injustice. We worked heavily on racial injustice throughout this semester and this movie does a great job of showing how an injustice can impact every aspect of people’s lives.

Race starts out by giving some background about Jesse Owens, the challenges he faces as a younger kid, and how he gets his start at Ohio State. This time is obviously a very racist time period in our country and throughout the world, so Jesse faces backlash the entire movie. One of the notable scenes is when him and another African American track member are trying to take a shower in the locker room. They are confronted by white football players and the football players make it very clear that they are more important and tell Jesse and his friend that they have to wait to shower until the football players are done. Nonetheless, Jesse becomes one of the best track and field stars at Ohio State and has the chance to go to the olympics to represent the United States in Berlin, Germany. This is at the height of the Hitler and Nazi regime, so it is very dangerous for Jesse to even go to the olympics. He has mixed emotions about going and the coach at Ohio State basically tells him that he is going to go and they get in an argument. The coach screams at him that he has nothing to worry about and that he has the chance to make history and Jesse emphatically responds by yelling, “Well you’re white Larry, you don’t have to!” This scenes leaves a drastic impact on the viewer and shows just how scared Jesse was to go. Jesse ends up winning almost every event and breaks multiple world records. It is such a good movie because Jesse one-ups all of the racists and bad people that doubted him.

To wrap up, I would recommend this movie to anyone. It does an awesome job of highlighting many of our course concepts like racial injustices, the othering, and intersectionality. It is very easy to see that Jesse feels like he is the other, and that the others do not want him to be successful. Intersectionality is present as well because all of Jesse’s white teammates still face injustices in Germany but they do not face the same ones that Jesse does. The director wants everyone to know this story and the fact that no matter your skin color, you can be successful at anything. I believe it is a great movie for everyone to watch, but especially for young African American kids because it is very easy for them to look up to this movie and show them that they can do anything they believe in and put their mind to!

Race Movie Review: Jesse Owens Biopic Comes Up Short | Time

Race (2016 film) - Wikipedia

Text Review – The Handmaid’s Tale

The TV show I would like to focus on is the Hulu Original, The Handmaid’s Tale. This show is also based off of the novel written by Margaret Atwood. I strongly recommend this show for leisure, but also to learn much more about the course concepts of identity and power. In this fictional series, women have been forced into sexual servitude throughout the majority of what was once known as the United States, but is now Gilead. This series follows the journey of handmaid, June Osborne who rebels against and tries to escape the enslavement put amongst her and the other females of this region. In her journey of rebellion and resilience, June discovers new things about the nation, herself, other handmaids, the people in charge, and she also faces many obstacles preventing her from freedom. 

Gender identity is a strong theme behind this story, as females of all positions are deemed as second-class citizens. Females of Gilead are only allowed to be, handmaids, those who have sex with a family’s husband to bear a child for he and his wife, marthas, those who cook and housekeep the home, aunts, those who train, control, and discipline the handmaids, wives, those who marry a commander, or prostitutes at Jezebels. Provided this description, women are at the beck and call of male leads in their lives. They all have to follow strict rules that are put forth by Gilead’s rulers, men. Females are not allowed to read or write and actually have no voice. Provided that, men have the opportunity to take on many roles within this society, as they can actually hold occupations, become eyes who are like government security, or become commanders. I think that gender identity strongly defines who people are within this society – if one is born female, she has limited, enslavement-like options, whereas if one is born male, they have potential to grow in status and position.

Power is certainly illustrated throughout this series in that the power of Gilead’s leaders is what controls the entire storyline. Power resides in the males, the commanders, who make the rules and enforce the policies that keep female voices from being heard. Overall, Gilead is a dictatorship in which all people must abide by all rules; there is no room for negotiation or they will be hung or assassinated. Power is implemented by the men and imposed on all of the women, which works as manipulation and control to keep them enslaved.

I think this series and storyline strongly relates to the concept of othering, as women are othered and mistreated as such. Along with that concept, I think this story does correlate well with Spivak’s Can The Subaltern Speak, as women’s voices and positions are oppressed, they are punished for using any voice, and they abide by the male-pleasing rules to satisfy them and avoid conflict.

Here's How D.C. Appears In 'The Handmaid's Tale' | DCist

West Side Story

West Side Story is a musical (and after a movie) that is a modern adaptation from Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. I’ve seen this movie/musical multiple times and even performed scenes from it, so I thought it would be a great example to discuss. The story takes us to the west side of New York City, where two rival gangs clash on behalf of claiming the territory in their neighborhood. The two gangs are the Sharks, who consist of Puerto-Ricans, and the Jets, who consist of white Americans. Bernardo led the Sharks while Riff led the Jets, but the story revolves around the love between Maria (Bernardo’s sister) and Tony (used to be a Jet).

Much like some of the other readings through this class, there is a clash of two different cultures, relating a lot to Lahiri’s stories in Interpreter of Maladies – specifically “When Mr. Pirzada Came to Dine.” This relationship in West Side Story is shown through the immense similarities of the two rival gangs. Much like how Lilia (from India) is confused about how someone like Mr. Pirzada is so similar yet is Pakistani not Indian, the two gangs share many similarities and one key difference – race. The two gangs have such a deep hatred of one another due to a native versus immigrant power dynamic. While Lahiri takes the reader through the various migration experiences of Indian-Americans and not Puerto-Ricans, the ideas of “othering” remain the same. The Sharks are met with hate speech, violence, and even some racial slurs. While this does mirror some of the negative experiences Lahiri describes, it is much more emphatic, brutal, and effective in West Side Story.

The two gangs meet to fight. Tony, who has fallen in love with Maria, attempts to stop the fight on her behalf. After Bernardo pushes Tony for trying to make peace, Riff retaliates and accidentally kills Bernardo, which leads to Tony killing him in a fit of rage. Still in love, Maria and Tony plan to run away together to escape all of the conflict that’s keeping them apart. Through some misinformation and more retaliation, Tony ends up begging a Shark to kill him because he thinks Maria died. Maria arrives just as he is killed, and tearfully tells both gangs “all of [them]” were responsible for the deaths. Realizing their hate is misplaced, the gangs put aside their racial differences and end the feud. 

Act 2 relates more closely to Things Fall Apart by Achebe. While in Achebe’s book, white missionaries invade Nigeria for colonization, the native versus migrant cultural clash is still present. In Things Fall Apart, the tension rises leading Okonkwo to kill himself similar to how Tony begs for Chino (a Shark) to kill him. Both blame the other for the loss, yet it is only in West Side Story that the realization that their hate for each other was to blame. It is this final scene that makes the message clear and effective.

Steven Spielberg's 'West Side Story' First Look Shows Cast Members - Variety

References:

Achebe, Chinua. Things Fall Apart. Penguin Books, 2017.

Lahiri, Jhumpa. Interpreter of Maladies: Stories. Mariner Books, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 

Wise, Robert and Jerome Robbins, directors. West Side Story. United Artists, 1961.

Text Review: The Falcon and the Winter Soldier- E.Hummer

Emily Hummer

Text Review Assignment

The Falcon and the Winter Soldier

The Falcon and the Winter Soldier is a new television series streaming on Disney Plus.  The season will be six episodes total and five of them have already aired. This series is a continuation of Marvel’s cinematic masterpieces, but this series is different in that Marvel is showing real world issues we are facing now. One of the main themes of the story is Sam “Falcon” Wilson having to deal with Steve Rogers giving him the Captain America shield as an old man at the end of Avengers: Endgame. This was a critical moment for Sam because not only would he become the new Captain America, but he would be a black man as Captain America. The thought of a black man having this much power in America wasn’t something the U.S. government forces wanted, so they manipulated Sam into retiring the shield and instead created a new Captain America, another white man. This exemplifies the power structure of the United States, how historically we have “othered” people of color and are still fighting this battle today.

Something else this series shows is a police confrontation. The two main characters, Bucky “Winter Soldier” Barnes and Sam, are in a verbal confrontation in the street when the police show up. They treat Sam and Bucky completely differently, as Bucky is white. Bucky, talking about Sam being the Falcon, finally says, “Do you know who this is?” Then the police finally realize it and back off. I think this really shows injustice within our police system at a time when it is truly relevant. Just before this scene Bucky had taken Sam to see Isaiah Bradley. Isaiah had not yet been introduced to the Marvel movies until now and he is a very important character, so Marvel took a huge step showing him. His back story is that he was the first black super soldier as well as technically the first black Captain America. But the cost of all of this was him being put in jail for 30 years to be experimented on. It opened Sam’s eyes to the possibility of a black Captain America because it has happened, but the cost in unbelievable.

This show is able to embed some very important concepts of injustice and power structures in a way Marvel has never done before. Marvel’s Black Panther took the huge step of showing an almost entirely black cast of strong fighters, and now with all of the underlying messages in The Falcon and the Winter Soldier Marvel is taking leaps to show the world something we all needed to see. I think the main idea the author wants you to take away is that a black man is just as worthy of that shield as anyone else.

Picture showcasing Isaiah Bradly (left) and Sam Wilson (right)