Rating: PG-13
Runtime: 2 hours, 21 minutes
Writers: Marcs Gardley, Alice Walker, Marcia Norman
Director: Blitz Bazawule
Quick Impressions:
Taraji P. Henson has convinced me that I need a red dress, a peacock fan, and a boat. Her arrival at Harpo’s Joint is probably the moment in The Color Purple that drew the biggest reaction from me. We hear that Shug wants to make an entrance. Then she shows up in an elegant boat with an enormous peacock hand fan covering her face, dressed to the nines. That’s when you know you’ve arrived—and everybody else knows, too. I whispered to my daughter, “From now on, I’m showing up everywhere like that.”
The Color Purple seemed like a great choice for a mother/daughter movie day, plus a New Year’s treat, and a nice way to celebrate the eve of her fifteenth birthday together. I read Alice Walker’s novel a few years ago when I was pregnant with her younger brother. (I guess by a few years, I mean eight or nine.) In grad school, I noticed an embarrassing deficiency (on my part) in African American literature (since I’d focused on Medieval and Renaissance British lit), so I’ve been trying to fill in that gap ever since. Even though I’m not always a fan of epistolary novels in general, I enjoyed The Color Purple. What made the biggest impression on me was the Celie/Shug Avery storyline, mainly because I couldn’t believe something good was finally happening to Celie.
I sometimes imagine scenes from the 1985 movie, odd because I’m nearly certain I’ve never seen it. Have I watched a handful of scenes? Did my familiarity with the cast lead me to plug them into what I imagined as I read? I’m not sure. In any event, I’ve never seen the musical. I wish I had at least listened to it before I went. Musicals usually work better for me if I know the songs before I see them. (Well, it’s more like this. I can’t resist discovering new musicals by listening to the songs, and then much later, I finally get the opportunity to watch them.) This film contains several show-stopping musical numbers, and I wish I could have sung along (or at least that I remembered the songs now).
I like this story told as a musical because it lessens the unbearable harshness of the plot. Celie comes from such unrelenting abuse. The movie shies away from showing us too much (and somehow manages to get a PG-13 rating, which is surprising for this story). It manages to convey the full horror of what is happening to her mainly through time jumps. If you’re paying attention, it should horrify you when ten years pass and nothing about Celie’s intolerable life changes at all. It’s a bit grating that characters habitually ask her why she lets herself be abused. Are you kidding? How in the world is it her own fault that she’s always being abused? When she can extract herself from the situation, she finally does, but abuse is hard to escape because of the psychological damage it inflicts.
The Good:
I felt deeply conflicted because—should The Color Purple be fun? I guess it should. Sofia (Danielle Brooks) is the best character! She injects so much life into the story. She’s just so vivacious and off-the-wall. (I felt so torn, though, because her in-your-face demeanor is a response to years of abuse and danger…and then it leads her into further abuse and danger.)
Brooks deserves an Oscar nomination for sure. Up till now, Da’Vine Joy Randolph was my personal pick for Best Supporting Actress, but Sofia breathes such life into the story. Maybe Danielle Brooks should win Best Supporting Actress. I’m genuinely torn. (America Ferrara gives that great speech in Barbie, too, but I feel like screenplay is the place to recognize that monologue.) Both my daughter and I liked Sofia the best.
I also think Colman Domingo should be nominated for his performance as Mr. That’s another instance that gives me pause. Really, he’s a terrible abuser. That he comes from a background of abuse is an explanation, not an excuse. But he’s so charismatic. It’s fun to watch Domingo play the character. He’s Dickensian in his awfulness. He’s larger-than-life, wicked, and yet he lights up the screen. And, of course, even he gets a redemption arc. The character leaves me morally conflicted and feeling guilty for liking him. (I mean, we see him hit and denigrate his wife repeatedly. We watch him sort of attempt to rape someone, then throw her out in the rain and fire a gun near her head. He’s not very nice.) There’s something weirdly likeable about the character, but it can’t be what he says or does. The actor deserves an Oscar nomination, though.
While I’m on the subject of Oscar nominations, I’ve liked Taraji P. Henson since Hustle & Flow, and Shug is my favorite character in the novel, so I liked that performance and wouldn’t mind seeing a nomination for Henson, either. Fantasia Barrino has some excellent moments as Celie, too, and I was disappointed to see Young Celie go because Phylicia Peal Mpsai is outstanding in that part. And I enjoyed recognizing Halle Bailey as Young Nettie.
The whole cast is good—Corey Hawkins as Harpo, Louis Gossett Jr. as the delightfully named Ol’ Mister. (Barrino is great in the scene where she “sweetens” his water for him.) There’s no point in going through the cast list person by person, shouting out everyone! They’re all good. And 1985 Celie Whoopi Goldberg makes a cameo as the midwife.
Best Scene Visually:
In my favorite scene, we get to hear the origin of the movie’s title, The Color Purple, as Shug and Celie walk through the meadow. As someone who loves crawling on her belly through random fields to get the perfect elevation for my wildflower photos, I couldn’t resist the way they shot this scene. It’s so gorgeous!
I also liked Shug’s sermon. Lately I appreciate wisdom wherever I find it, and I love the idea of finding God in the wildflowers. I smiled instinctively when I heard my daughter laugh as Shug explained, “That’s why He’s in everything.”
That’s a wonderful scene.
Best Scene:
Sofia is my favorite character, so I love all her scenes. (I also really like the phrase, “I haven’t seen you since Jesus wept.” That’s great! It reminds me of how in my grandma’s old autograph book from middle school, everybody signed stuff like, “Yours till snakes wear garters.”)
What happens with the mayor’s wife is so horrible. It’s like everything that Celie has been suffering in the periphery is suddenly brought right to the center of the screen when Sofia’s combative nature leads to something truly horrific. This was my least favorite thing to watch in the movie because I love Sofia’s spirit and felt so genuinely dismayed and alarmed. Then again, it’s also the strongest dramatic material in the movie for the same reasons.
Best Action Sequence:
I was going to say, “The attempted rape scene.” But now I find myself wondering, “Was that attempted rape?” Maybe Mr. was so mad in part because he would have had to rape her (violently) in order to have sex with her. Maybe what he desired was consensual sex. At any rate, it goes beyond boorish behavior when you sneak into your wife’s sister’s room at night, and then there’s a scuffle that ends in (literally) throwing someone out of the house in the rain and firing a gun repeatedly screaming at them to leave. It might not exactly be rape, but it’s a big step beyond bad manners.
I also enjoyed watching the curse on Mr. play out over time, and his dramatic reactions and transformation.
The Negatives:
When we saw this movie, the parking lot was packed, and then there was no one in the theater lobby. We watched The Color Purple with a handful of others, fewer than ten. That’s a weird way to watch a musical for the first time, so, without a doubt, part of the issue was our viewing experience. Still, for a musical, this did not have particularly memorable songs.
Now granted, most times I see a musical, I’m already familiar with an original cast recording or movie soundtrack. Because I live so far from any big theatre district, I listen to musicals before I see them. But my November and December were so hectic, I forgot to listen to The Color Purple.
Usually I leave a musical humming, though, unable to stop singing snatches of what I’ve heard. (Trust me. It’s a very annoying habit.) In this case, bits of the choreography stick with me instead of snatches of the music (which is odd, for me). The one song that does jump out at me is the one Shug performs for Celie in Memphis (but I can’t exactly remember that one, either). I guess I need to buy the movie soundtrack. This may be less a problem with the film than with my scattered mind.
I also sometimes felt I was enjoying the antics of the characters too much. I don’t know why I feel so guilty for enjoying watching the movie. Celie’s suffering is so intense, and it’s so downplayed. It didn’t help to have the American Fiction trailer play right before the movie started. Reading the book didn’t lead me to expect I’d have such a good time watching this story. I’m bothered by the fact that we don’t feel Celie’s suffering more.
Overall:
I’d watch The Color Purple again (and probably will because my husband hasn’t scene it yet). Though I can’t help feeling its parts sometimes outshine it as a whole, the film is fun and full of heart and contains Oscar-worthy performances by Danielle Brooks and Colman Domingo. Now I need to watch the 1985 film. It’s inexcusable that I haven’t seen it. I also need to find a field and look for wildflowers. Sometimes the purple ones bloom even into the late fall. If I look hard enough, I might find a few in winter.