Mad Max: Fury Road Makes My Heart and Breaks My Heart

Caution: Spoilers!

As I watched the new Mad Max: Fury Road, which was released yesterday to the general public, I felt torn asunder. And no, not only because it’s a pumping near-nonstop thrill ride of explosions and pulsing light which, especially when you’re sitting in the third row, makes your brain shake in a way that’s oddly pleasurable. I was split because as I watched, my sensibilities were simultaneously applauding, “at last” and sadly whispering, “oh, not again.” You see, this new Mad Max is feminist and racist. Which is a shame because Mel Gibson is nowhere to be seen and because I really wanted to love it.

I’m black. And I’m a woman. And I’m mixed. (Oh, the dualisms!) But as I watched Fury Road, I was struck by how progressive and regressive it was. For me, it was like stepping forward with the left leg and stepping backward with the right: in the end, you’re in about the same place as you started, you’re just standing in an awkward position. Forget tragic mulatto. This was a case of Tragic BlackFeminist.

And the film is feminist! On purpose! Eve Ensler, author of the Vagina Monologues, was a consultant on the film. She calls it a “feminist action film.” The catalyst of the story is that five super hot sex slaves determine that they no longer want to be super hot sex slaves. They want to be super hot independent ladies living in a green place somewhere on the other side of the dangerous dessert. So they abandon their wart-covered captor, Immortan Joe, and head off with their savior, a badass, one-armed warrioress, a WOMAN, Imperator Furiosa. Oh, and lady is furious (though it’s mostly internal fury until about 2 hours into the movie when she finally collapses in the sand to let it all out because “REALLY? I DROVE ALL THIS WAY!”). These women maintain that they deserve to not be raped all day, or, in Imperator’s case, used as a gas-slinging mercenary, and they save themselves. But not before scrawling “WE ARE NOT THINGS” onto the wall of their abandoned jail safe. Not exactly subtle, George Miller, but at least we know where your head is at.

I mean, this movie is set in an apocalyptic wasteland dystopia. The plot could have centered around a number of other issues: war over oil, war over water, war over vegetables, war over hand soap. But Miller chose to make the plot a war over women in which the women fought for themselves. When Max eventually joins the battle, he shares the spotlight with Imperator, the two of them slashing, swerving, shooting and slaying together. Furiosa’s the better shot. She knows how to drive the rig. And she does it all with one arm (though, to be fair, her attachment looks pretty aerodynamic and solid). To really drive (pun-intended) home the feminist point, the escapees are eventually joined by the Many Mothers, a band of motorbike riding, leathery-skinned old women (all looking over at least 40 - but that could have been the severe effects of sun and wind damage over a long period of time - and with pretty killer bods) who shoot and ride and slash and explode with the best of them. Oh, and they love plants.

This is not to say that the film is without its feminist issues. The women are all pretty generic wispy supermodel types (or, in the cases of Rosie Huntington-Whiteley and Riley Keough, actual models). But the same basic story could have been told with the ladies tied in a cave with Mad Max rushing to rescue them. But Miller put them in the thick of it, crawling around moving vehicles, loading guns, fixing stuff, and kicking ass. Unlike Seth MacFarlane’s “A Million Ways to Die in the West,” Charlize Theron maintains her power pretty much throughout the film. She saves the day, not Max. Sure, Max gives her his blood when she’s exsanguinated, but woman got stabbed real bad and then still proceeded to rip Warlord’s face off. SHE RIPPED OFF HIS FACE! My female side walked away empowered and overjoyed. Women getting it in for themselves with a little help from the guys: it feels pretty good.

And then comes the flip side. This film was shot on location in Namibia and there is not one dark face. There’s a brown face, offered up by Zoë Kravitz, but that’s it. One non-white face in the entire film. And one thing that gets me is that nobody really seems to be talking about it. There are articles up the wazoo about the film’s feminism, its gusto, its stunning visual effects and wild kinetic energy. But, race? Meh. In a recent article by The Daily Dot, the author applauds the feminist stance and then wraps it up with a “well it’s not perfect…. apparently there’s only one non-white person.” And people love to talk about this stuff, black and white alike. When the Biblical films Noah and Exodus: Gods and Kings were cast with white, primarily British, actors playing folks from the Middle East (I mean, you couldn’t even do olive-skinned, Ridley Scott… Christian Bale and Sigourney Weaver?!), people were livid. Racism! they shouted! How dare he! they shouted. Where’s all the fury over Fury Road?

And perhaps it’s because Fury Road is a fantasy that people aren’t seeing how colorless it is. This is a pretend-time movie, not obviously set in any place. Technically, the people “should” no more be black or Asian or latina/o or Middle Eastern than they “should” be white. We don’t know what happened when the atomic bombs went off. But it’s a shame George Miller didn’t consider that the future world would, or could, be a colorful mix of races. Black, white, Asian, latina/o, Middle Eastern all vying for a small set of resources, all manickly charging around the dessert pumping each other full of lead and fire. And a dark-skinned woman would have looked STUNNING in one of those white scarf dresses the 5 Wives were clad in. Lupita Nyong’o would have killed it as one of the wives. Her skin, that fabric. Talk about a missed opportunity. Even from an aesthetic standpoint, the film would have been more interesting with a mix of color.

I’ve already started to get into debates with people about why there wasn’t diversity. The usual “it’s hard to make a film with people of color” scenario. Well, it’s also hard to make a film about women and Miller managed to do that. And, truth of the matter is, it’s actually NOT that hard to make a film with people of color. Look at The Matrix. Chock full of people of color. Another pretend-time movie where people could have been anything (it was based inside of a computer for godsakes). And the film was all the more visually and conversationally interesting for it. Beyond that, some science-fiction has long been on the frontier (pun-intended) for pushing the race-mixing boundary. Star Trek had the first interracial TV kiss. It had Asians, blacks, whites, latina/os, greens, reds and blues. On the other hand, Star Wars is still struggling to find its racial footing, still skirting by with only a few people of color per set of of films (Billy Dee Williams in Episodes IV-VI, Samuel L. Jackson in Episodes I-III and now my girl Lupita in Episode VII: The Force Awakens). People have been critical of these films because why are there no black people in the future? That’s a question which deserves to be asked. And answered.

People have also started in on the “at least there are women, nothing is perfect” argument. To that I say, holding up a film to a critical lens and saying “here’s a success, here’s a failure,” doesn’t negate the successes. I adored most aspects of Fury Road. The visuals were STUNNING, the music was WILD, the costumes were out-of-control-over-the-top mixes of steampunk and goth and Predator (Immortan Joe looked like 80s rocker Predator), the feminist stance was FEMINIST! It was fun, rolicking and I want to see it again. (Like tomorrow. Who will go with me?) I love post-apocalyptic dystopian futures (give me Brave New World, 1984, The Handmaid’s Tale, Never Let Me Go (subtle but dystopian) any day) and Mad Max: Fury Road transports you on a roller coaster ride of adrenaline pumping, campy insanity. Yet the fact of the matter remains, there was ONE non-white person in the movie and that is an issue. That deserves conversation because this isn’t a Jane Austen novel, it’s a made-up reality in which the director had choices. I mean, Peter Jackson put black people in The Hobbit for crying out loud. Idris Elba is in Thor (and people freaked because they’re supposed to be Nordic gods... Yes, but they’re also made up).

The fact of the matter is, it is possible to like (nearly LOVE) a film and simultaneously remain critical of its failings. I’m not furious about Fury Road, but I am really, really disappointed. And isn’t that a little bit worse?

Oh Hey Fantasia (1940): Ya'll Must've Been Out Your Damn Minds

I had one of my brilliant ideas today. And then Disney shattered it.

This is where it all began: my 5th grade class recently started reading "Percy Jackson and The Olympians: Book One: The Lightning Thief," as the read-aloud portion of our reading workshop. As the baller teacher that I am, I had taken it upon myself to start a mini-unit on Greek mythology. Hello, "Percy Jackson and The OLYMPIANS." These kids know jack squat about some freakin' Olympians. So, just today, we watched a video on brainpop, perused through some illustrated books on mythology and the students picked Greek gods, goddesses and mythical creatures out of a sombrero (an excellent teacher would have had a Greek hat... a laurel wreath?) at random and began researching them on their personal laptop computers (technology grant!). They're going to make powerpoint presentations (technology grant!).

On a completely different genius thread, I had started playing classical music to my students during morning work time and some math work time. Hello, classical music makes kids smarter. Mainly, we're listening to my favorite composer, Beethoven. The kids are surprisingly into it. They say things like, "this part sounds sneaky." Ah, inferencing from music. My job here is done. They're LOVING it. They're rushing home to download it now. Or, I suppose any music played during school is a welcome change from the typical SILENCE expected by the public education system. YOU WILL BE QUIET AND DO YOUR WORK IN SILENCE WITHOUT TALKING. Anyway, as I watched Itzhak Perlman blow it out of the water on his mothereffin violin on a recent episode of the Colbert Report, I got to thinking, "I want to show these 21st century urban philistines (aka my students) just how powerful classical music can be! If only there were some sort of awesome entity that combined images with music... preferably classical music... images that kids can appreciate... like a cartoon..."

Aha! The brilliant idea emerged: MOTHEREFFIN' FANTASIA. I happened to know for a fact that Beethoven's "Pastoral Symphony" was featured in "Fantasia" during a series of scenes based on characters from Greek mythology. Thank you, childhood: about 10 VHS tapes and no cable TV led to a lot of viewings of "Fantasia." Freakin' centaurs and satyrs and cupids all hanging out being bosses until eventually Zeus shows up to hurl lightning bolts at them. Can we say, "PERFECT?!" Talk about cross-curricular teaching. Play a video featuring both Greek mythology and Beethoven? And then make those young scholars write a response to it. The kids'd be all like, "Yo, Ms. H! We're makin' mad connections! You plan this or somethin'?" "Yeah, I did." To youtube!

I did not happen to know for a fact that "Fantasia" is some fucked up racist naughty bullshit.

We open on a pool where female centaurs are bathing. NUDE. And their perky female centaur boobs are just out in the open, nipples rustling in the wind. Ok fine, I can appreciate the human form but playing naked centauresses (?) to a class of 11-year-olds is certainly a fireable offense. Maybe I can cue it up to after the boobs?

Well, it's hard to do that because right after the boobs there's a cenatur pickaninny. So, that kind of put a damper on my relationship with "Fantasia." A freakin' hair-braided-big-eyed-big-lipped-earrning-wearing-dark-skinned centaur DOING ANOTHER FEMALE CENTAUR'S NAILS. AND FREAKIN' LOVIN' IT. Later on, the female pickanniny centaur is trotting behind the other centaur carrying her wreath for her and that bitch freakin' swishes the pickaninny centaur in the face with her freakin' tail! And let's be clear here: Disney drew blue centaurs and pink centaurs and puke green centaurs but the brown centaur is a pickaninny centaur.



Later, Dyonisus shows up and is just a stupid, drunk, fat baby in a diaper accompanied by two black Zebra centaurs. They're fanning him so clearly they work for him in some capacity but being from Africa, they get to be exoticized so they're way sexy and very flirtatious. ;-)

Overall, I determined that this excerpt of "Fantasia" was not an appropriate cross-curricular activity for the students in my class. Too many boobs and drunk dudes acting like asses in wine rivers and cupid butts and, oh yeah, pickaninnies. My mother and father were pretty pro-nudity in films and pretty pro-wine at dinner so it's no wonder they let me watch this stuff. Besides, the cupids don't even have genitals... which opens up a whole other door of conversations I'm not trying to have with prepubescent kids.

Apparently, the pickaninny version has been banned from public viewing since 1969. The same year my alma mater went co-ed. Ah, PROGRESS.

Outed By An Old Adage

I work in a collaborative classroom. That means two teachers. One of them is me. The other is somebody else. We get along well and seem to genuinely like each other. It's a pretty good deal. For example, we rarely take home papers to grade because we split up the work. And our posters are out-of-control-awesome because we split up the work. Splitting up the work is a great time saver and poster-making strategy. That's one thing I've learned during my 3rd year of teaching.

Apparently, the administration has noticed that we work well together as they've assigned us to move up to a 5th Grade Integrated Collaborative Teaching classroom next year. Cool. I bet we'll continue splitting up the work and saving time and making awesome posters. Well, it's not next year yet. It's still this year. And the school year is finally winding down. Even though it's been a breeze compared to my previous years, who doesn't love summer vacation? Okay, I can name a few people who don't love summer vacation but they seem pretty lonely and slightly depressed, over all.

As a part of the school year finally winding down, my students had to complete their Final Writing Assessment so that we can judge their growth or decline or stagnation. Their task: "What, in your opinion, makes an excellent teacher? Write a description of a teacher you have had who you think was excellent and explain why. Also, include an example from your life, or from a book or a film, that supports your opinion what about what makes a teacher excellent. Do not use the teacher's name. Be sure to use proper grammar and mechanics as well as clear and specific language."

We got back a number of pretty typical responses. "An excellent teacher is kind." "A great teacher takes their time to teach each student how that student learns best." "I once had a great teacher because she was very patient." "My teachers are funny and stylish and classy and friendly and excellent dancers." Preach it, kid! About seven or eight papers in, I came across a student, let's call him Ezekiel, who decided to use this writing task to out me as a liar:

"I have one teacher who I like and another who I do not like. The teacher I like is no [sic] funny and I like her because she tells the truth and didn't lie. She explains things in clear [sic] and communicative way and she didn't lie about going to Magascar [sic]. I only listen to this teacher and I don't listen to the other teacher who lie [sic] about going to Magascar when she didn't go."

I've recently been talking a lot about the sovereign nation of Madagascar. I've been talking about it quite frequently, actually, as I model finding inspiration for our poetry unit. Modeling goes like this: "We are going to write haikus based on places that we've been. Think of a place you have been that brings back a vivid memory. That means it's full of details. What do you see? What do you smell? Hear? Taste? Feel? I'm thinking about the marketplace in Madagascar. I see the long steps that lead down to Analakely; that's the name of the market place. I smell vanilla and pineapples and even garbage! I hear ladies bartering; that means excitedly discussing the price of an item. I taste the sweet, tangy pineapple. I feel the heat from the scorching sun. You need to be detailed when writing poetry so you must be detailed when remembering a place that is going to inspire a poem. I remember this place very well because I went there almost every day for two months."

At least, this is what I told the kids. But Ezekiel saw right through me. I'm a freakin' liar!! I only told them that because they love that movie, "Madagascar," where Chris Rock plays a rambunctious zebra next to Ben Stiller's cocky lion. You've gotta get kids anyway you can. I goad them with lies and bribe them with candy and recess. We only spend about 3 hours a day in the classroom because we're always heading outside to run wild on Candy and Recess bribes. I'm like, "Please, just write this poem and I'll give you candy and recess! Hey, I've been to Madagascar! Does that impress you?! I met King Julian, the lemur! He's been captured and has lost a lot of his pep. It's a sad story. If I tell you about it will you please just do your work so I can get a high teacher rating and a monetary bonus! Bloomberg! Four more years! Four more years!"

Good eye, Ezekiel. Good eye.

The truly beautiful thing about this whole incident is that this kid is often biting other kids in the face... and then lying about it. I guess that old adage is right: it takes one to know one.

Confessions of a 60 Year Old Canadian

Apparently, my father recently told my fake sister that my mother is his hero because "she never shirks responsibility and she always has such a positive outlook on life."

This is the most tender thing I have heard in my life.

Hey, Know Your Audience

My teacher companions and I took the 4th grade kids to a show at Brooklyn College this most recent Friday to see the National Dance Troupe of Jamaica. Many of the kids are from the West Indies so, as one can imagine, they were pretty stoked. It's an eclectic audience of children ranging from some kindergartners to middle school students.

The first performance was a dance number with two live drummers making the beats on what looked to be Goumbe drums. The dancers were wearing colorful costumes with long trains and exposed abdomens. The men were shirtless with long pants and groin wraps. Groin wraps that looked like colorful diapers. It was, admittedly, an hilarious costume choice. Children giggled. Children were shushed but only halfheartedly; fools shouldn't wear diapers on stage.

Performance two featured older singers singing traditional songs. A little dated, the kids were not as impressed.

Performance three was introduced as a "very colorful and lively dance" meant to address life in Kingston, Jamaica. It was titled "Urban Fishing." We open on a lone dancer in silhouette. She appears to be topless. No music accompanies her presence, only static. She is twisting and turning, looking around, her movements denoting terror through her contortions. The children are confused, grumbles an giggles are heard from the crowd. The lights come up revealing that she is wearing only they tiniest flesh-colored tube bra I've ever seen and some cargo pants. Then, gunshots come blaring through the speakers. The dancer hits the deck. The audience of children scream. Now, snippets of Bob Marley's "No More Trouble" start interrupting the static. More dancers enter, their bodies contorting. They are wearing a variety of booty shorts and skintight jeans and tube tops. A green forked symbol adorns their clothing. What is that? Is that meant to be a marijuana leaf? Oh, yes, yes it is. Oh, ok, I see... marijuana promotion. That's awesome. For fourth graders. The dancers start coming together. The women slowly rub against the men. The men grab their bodies. Faces are placed near groins. Pelvises gyrate. Legs scissor and straddle. The gunshots continue to interrupt the static and song. The children gasp and giggle. The teachers eyes widen and heads shake in confusion. Heads are hidden in hands. This continues for a good 7 minutes. 7 minutes of horror.

Had I gone to this performance with a group of my grown, adult, non-minor friends, I would have likely enjoyed it at least a little. The dancers were spectacular artists with great control over their bodies and intense passion. But I say to you, Brooklyn College and the National Dance Troupe of Jamaica, please. Please, please, please: know your fuckin' audience. Now I've got to talk to some kids about sexy dancing and why they need not reenact what they saw on a school-sponsored field trip.

Buffalo Soldier Gets the Blues

It being February, it has officially been not only acceptable but expected for teachers to educate our young people about black history for 26 days. Only three days left, people! We had better make the most of it. And thank goodness for leap year.


[Side note conspiracy theory: The reason we have February Break in February has nothing to do with heating costs or winter depression. It is so that students will have 7 fewer days in school during Black History Month. How are teachers supposed to truly explore such a complex history or truly delve into all of the important figureheads such as Malcolm X and Shirley Chisolm when there are only 18 days to work with? Factor in weekends and we're down to 16 actual school days. Factor in that we're only slated to teach "Social Studies" two days a week and we've dropped down to 8. Better stick to MLK and Harriet Tubman and then move on, suckas. Another victory for the white majority.]

But I digress... Back to brass tax. During our "official" celebration of Black History, my 4th grade class and I went to see a free children's concert of Toshi Reagon at The Town Hall earlier this month. She sang a variety of traditional black-American songs including "Juba," a slave-children's song, and "Ain't Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me Around," by Sweet Honey and the Rock. Before singing a song in the style of traditional black-American blues, she decided to gauge the audience's prior knowledge. What follows is a transcript of that event.

Toshi Reagon: Who here has heard of the blues?
[About 75% of the audience, most of whom are children, raise their hands.]
 Toshi Reagon: Well, well, that's certainly impressive. So if you've heard of the blues, who here has the blues?
[About 50% of the audience, most of whom are children, raise their hands. This seems a surprisingly high number for a group of 7 to 10-year-olds. I notice that the student sitting next to me has his hand raised. Let us call him Marley.]
Me: You have the blues, Marley? What do you have the blues about?
[Marley looks at me as if I am completely dense. Apparently, the answer is terribly obvious. With a shrug of his shoulders and wiggle of his head he replies, clearly annoyed by my naivete.]
Marley: Slavery, of course!

I guess that's what I get for having taken the class to the African Burial Grounds two weeks beforehand. Watch out, white America, we've got some soldiers on our hands.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vYGdczGJTgY

Romantic Comedy Drinking Game

Last Friday night, my friend Aapta suggested we watch the terrible movie, "Something Borrowed." The movie was so terrible (and surprisingly disturbing in its views of female relationships) that it couldn't be finished soberly. We looked online for a Romantic Comedy Drinking Game, couldn't find one, were shocked and then made our own.

Now I share it with you:

(DISCLAIMER: This game is meant to be played with beer, wine or a responsibly mixed drink. Do not take shots; it will kill you. Also, drink responsibly, people. Always have a DD or live in a city with awesome public transportation.)

Take a sip whenever one of the following tropes occurs: 

* a montage                                                                     
* a flashback
* a flashback montage (2 sips)
* a pensive reflection with a weepy vocal arrangement accompaniment (2 sips if the character walks next to the water)
* voice over
* choreographed dance number
* magic
* token gay friend
* token black friend
* token white friend (I'm talkin' "Just Wright" here, people)
* there is no token friend/the movie is super racist
* no token friend because the movie is a mixed race wet dream (3 sips in celebration!!)
* token "chubby" friend (2 sips if she is clearly no bigger than a size 8)
* token kooky friend (i.e. a fat, pathetic brother; a hot mess co-worker with an obnoxious voice)
* a wedding (2 sips if it's overly-fancy)
* wedding dress shopping
* drunk/embarrassing wedding speech by best man/maid of honor/brother/sister
* confession of love (2 sips if it's raining or they are crying, 3 sips for both)
* realization of love
* running through crowds to confess love (2 sips if this is accompanied by a sweeping musical score)
* an actress who would clearly be a hottie in real life is playing the "Plain Jane" character (2 sips if it's because she's got brown hair or glasses, 3 sips if it's because she's got both)
* the BFF becomes the love interest/love of the protagonists life
* random shots of famous landmarks (i.e. Eiffel Tower, Empire State Building, London Eye)
* scene shot in currently trendy and recognizable "hot spot" (i.e. Rice to Riches, Magnolia Cupcakes)
* characters are in a loft space
* really rich people stuff is treated as normal, everyday behavior (i.e. shopping at Bergdorf Goodman's,  summer house in Hamptons, exotic vacation)
* a notoriously low paying job leads to that character somehow being able to do awesome stuff (related to above but can come up in various ways)
* a bet is made
* a challenge is accepted
* two women fight but never use their fists
* two women fight and use their fists (2 sips)
* a sassy black or Latina lady makes a quippy, quite stereotypical one-liner (i.e. "Not on my bus!" "That some white booty I'd like to tap, girlfriend! [eyebrow raise]" "Oh no she di-int!")
* someone sings bad karaoke
* a large fancy party is thrown
* a misunderstanding occurs that becomes a central problem in the movie but could have been easily avoided or resolved by the characters simply talking to each other
* a meddling family member/friend causes problems for the main character
* multiple story lines that eventually intermingle
* you feel terribly uncomfortable by whatever it is that you are seeing
* a sex scene that only goes as far as undies and then a fade-out
* frantic making out
* morning regret
* hot man abs
* a kiss (2 sips if it's the last shot of the movie)

Feel free to send any suggestions for things we missed. And add your own, people.

Drink happily.