Today in class, we had an open discussion on the movie "The Best Man Holiday." I had not seen it before class, but the discussion prompted me to go back to my DVD collection to watch "The Best Man" and then go see "The Best Man Holiday."
Now that I've seen "The Best Man Holiday" I can see what the fuss is with USA Today. To the white man, it may be seen as a race movie as it is an all black cast. However wrong that view is, that is what that one writer at USA Today saw. What he FAILED to see was the concepts in the movie are relevant to ALL of us!! It just happened that this movie had a black cast instead of a white cast. It could just as easily been all Latino or French or even a Gay cast such as "Noah's Arc: Jumbing the Broom." Oh, wait, that was a black cast as well, so is that one a race-themed movie or a gay-themed movie?
My one question is this; Why in the 21st Century are we STILL hung up on the non-issue of race? Why is this still a problem with certain people? It is really unfortunate that the idea of "other-ness" separates a lot of folks from learning about the people that actually populate this world!
I don't really know what kind of things I expected in "The Best Man Holiday." My feeling at the end of the first movie was that everybody but the pimp-daddy actually became a better person by the end of the movie so maybe I thought he'd grow up a bit by this movie. (I suppose at this point I will have to warn you: SPOILER ALERT!!! Don't read any further if you want to be surprised). I surely did not expect the story to end the way it did in this latest version, no to cover the topic of death so well. Death is hard for us all to talk about but even more so during the holidays. My maternal grandmaother passed Nov 30, 1968, my mother on Dec 1, 1989 and my dad on Feb 3, 1990 (2 days before his 68th birthday) and I still feel the holiday blues at this time of year. The themes presented in "The Best Man Holiday" are common to all of us in the human race. The movies starting Kevin Hart that were seen in trailers before "TBMH" might be a race themed movie. But even then, I am uncomfortable saying that.
People talked about "the black experience" in class but what really is "the black experience"? I have white skin, he has dark skin and we both have an experience of life. Is it that much different because a person is black? Only as far as racist treatment of the individual, perhaps. But we all dream of a better life, family, the future, goals, aspirations, love, and relationships with other people whether they are black, white, yellow or red.... gay, straight, bi or transgendered. That's all the same, but the experience has to do with how people are relating to oneself. Now, how people relate to me is not necessarily the same as how they would treat a person with darker skin. But really, that is the ONLY difference...the skin color.
I don't care if you are black, white, gay, straight, etc. If you treat me with any kind of respect, you have my respect in return. And at the same time, I will do my best to show YOU respect regardless of color, sexual preference, etc.
And in the end, such as shown in "The Best Man Holiday," life goes on and it's our friendships and our loved ones that mean the most to us. And it's how we are remembered by them after we've gone that gives us immortality.
Thank you for reading this, please feel free to leave a comment or ask me a question.
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