It doesn't matter whether or not that movie COULD be someone's reality. Shit, for all I know, Harry Potter could be someone's reality. I don't care. I'm not talking about the movie on a personal, individual level, but rather, I'm concerned with the way in which the movie functions within the context of the racist (and sexist) industry that churned it out...and within the context of the racist status quo that lapped it up like sugar water.

For instance, I'm sure there are some Black people out there who are just buffoons by nature, the kinds of people that'll do ANYTHING for a laugh...like there are some who are really gang members, sex machines, sex goddesses, or shady, evil cops...but when I start seeing a pattern of representation where it seems that movie after movie depicts Black people in one of three to five ways, shit gets problematic because I believe that representation is constituitive, meaning that the media has such a strong influence on what we as a society view as "reality," that such LIMITED representation of Black people in the mass media is actually detrimental to us as we try to live our daily lives. For Whites, who get the entire spectrum of representation on a daily basis, this is not as much of a concern. When I watch a movie, especially one that tries to deal with race, I think about more than whether or not I believe what I saw could have happened to someone somewhere at some time...which in the case of Monster's Ball, I really didn't. For me, that is not sufficient analysis, given the reality of the way the media affects the way people define race...as sad as that is.