Prominent African-American film critic eviscerates Precioius — Page 2

But doesn't he have a point about the poverty-stricken blackness of the story somehow being a catch-all for OTT melodrama?

I'm inclined to think that if, say, Lars Von Trier made a film about a white teenager who was poor AND obese AND an outcast AND abused by her mother AND molested by her father AND had two kids by him AND one of them has Down's Syndrome AND she has AIDS...the same critics and audiences that are heralding this as the biggest thing since the last time someone saw the Virgin Mary in a grilled cheese would never stop whipping him for such sensasionalistic silliness.

But this is about urban blacks. Thus its totally realistic.

Of course, Von Trier probably would have included a scene where a tearful Precious drowns her babies in the toilet or something, but something tells me that PRECIOUS isn't all that far down the road from portraying such a thing.

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Updated On: 11/6/09 at 06:03 PM

He lost me when he called Norbit and Beloved great films.

I have no opinion on Precious yet, because I haven't seen it, though I want to.

I agree with best12.

History will look favorably on BELOVED. I, too, think it is quite a riveting film (and I HATE O and Morrison, the latter with a passion) due in no small part to Jonathan Demme's tasteful, elegant, (and a little languid) direction. This is the man who directed THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS, after all, and I think he really could have made it much more "horror"-fying and his restraint is what makes it work, much as it does in SOTL. The book isn't very good, but the story works quite well on film (better?). I also LOVE Thandie Newton and Danny Glover in this, as well. Plus, it's Demme's best film besides SOTL (MELVIN & HOWARD is fun, but...). I think if you watch it now, a decade later, you will see that the O hype killed it and there is a terse, tense tale being told here, just not in the way you might have expected it to be told.

P

Updated On: 11/7/09 at 02:11 PM

Per boxofficemojo, this film made over $1.8 million on just 18 screens. That's a ridiculous, unheard of average of over $100k per screen.
box office

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