Hollywoodland

To me, the mark of a good movie is how much I think about it after I've left the theater, days have passed and what happens when it pops back into my mind. With those criteria in mind, I really liked Hollywoodland.

To be fair, I'm no movie critic. I didn't study film in school and when I go to the movies, I really enjoy getting lost in the story (if I can) and letting myself go on the journey with the characters.

The above did not happen with Cars. It did happen with Hollywoodland.

Of course, getting lost in Adrian Brody's eyes is pretty damn easy and with his surprisingly sexy good looks. Wow. Halle Berry was one lucky Oscar presenter.

Movies like this are faced with a unique challenge. They're set in an era where minorities were excluded from everyday life and if they did show up, they were servants or being abused in some way. Many films do this unabashedly and I'm sure the conversation in the casting room is unfortunately shallow.

Another annoying thing period movies often do is use there eras as excuses for referring to minorities derrogatively. They'll drop in whatever racial epithets they feel like in the name of authenticity, but such words usually just pull the reader out of the story and make cognisant audiences squirm uncomfortably for a scene or two.

But HWL handled the minority issue very well. Set in the upper tiers of Hollywood society, there was a singular type of person the film focused on--leaving little room for darker faces. So I was surprised the first time we see a servant in the movie to see that she's white.

Now, of the two servants who have under-five/featured extra roles, the white maid was the only one with lines. Later, we see a black servant. She has no lines and we only see her from the back.

This is both merciful and curious.

On one hand, it's nice that she didn't speak. Often with roles like this, the black person is made to be shuffling and truckling and a close cousin to Mr. Fetchit. The fact that the black maid didn't talk made her seem almost more in control of her life than the white maid who has an exchange with Brody.

However, if she had lines, it would have been an opportunity for her to deliver them as a well spoken, strong woman and not just a maid. Why weren't the parts swtiched? Who knows. Is it really that big of a deal? In this film, not really, but it is something to think about.

Right after I get done thinking about Adrian. :) (whose ethnicity, incidentally, plays not part in the movie. as in this case, it shouldn't.)