I Refuse to Monetarily Support Movies Without Minorities

Lately, my response to those that ask me if I'm going to see a movie in the theater is, "Nope, there aren't enough black people in it." For some reason, this never ceases to surprise people, even those that know me and understand that my blackness is the most prominent part of my identity.

Black culture and Black dollars are incredibly important in America, but for some reason, people in art forms like film act like the Black presence is not. There is a reason that Black people came out in droves to support Black Panther and identified so much with it, because the number of recent black films that are pro-black and have black casts is incredibly small.

I recently listened to Still Processing, a podcast put out by the New York Times with hosts Jenna Wortham and Wesley Morris. In the most recent episode, "We Watch Whiteness," they discuss what White culture is and its presence in the recent film, A Quiet Place. At first, I thought that Wortham and Morris were reaching when discussing the white characters' fear of the brown monsters in the film. However, when you realize that the brown monsters seem to be the only representation of minorities in the film, their analysis makes perfect sense.

Of course, I appreciate all of the groundbreaking work that this film does. It brings subtitles into movie theaters and brings sign language onto such a large screen in front of so many people. However, when looking at the film through an Ethnic Studies lens, you can't ignore the lack of minorities and the respective color of the "monsters" from which the starring family is hiding. There doesn't seem to be any concept of race in the movie at all, not because it doesn't matter, but because the characters are all of the same race and therefore have no need to worry about it. In contrast, characters in movies with all black casts are constantly concerned with their race because there is no situation in which it does not matter. This is even a concern within Black Panther, since T'Challa and the rest of the Wakandans live in a nation where their race does not matter, but they are portrayed in the Western media as a part of the "invented Africa" (that is the idea of Africa that is created in the West, probably as a product of imperialism).

With all of this being said, I don't wish to pay money to watch movies where characters don't think about race. It's a social construct, but now that it has been constructed and affects the lives of so many, it deserves time and attention. I would rather read spoilers and watch snippets and recap videos so that I don't miss out on the significance that these films provide, but I will not be supporting them fiscally.

At this point in my life, I have no desire to support what does not support me. I am no longer interested in seeing movies solely comprised of people that are not minorities. I am not of the mindset that we need to do away with black films about slavery and/or civil rights because these eras were so instrumental and important to the black community. However, I am of the mindset that there need to be more movies that create positive depictions of black people, in addition to positive depictions of other minorities. The amount of buzz that has begun to circulate around Crazy Rich Asians is amazing and speaks to the fact that all consumers want and deserve to be represented on film screens.