The Color Purple, directed by Steven Spielberg, chronicles the struggles of a black southern woman growing up in the early 1900’s in a world riddled with prejudice, sexism and poverty. Whoppie Goldberg, in her first leading role, commands a list of quality performers. Oprah Winfrey, Danny Glover and Maya Angelou are all members of this 1984 drama, making it one of the first feature films with the majority of its cast to be African American, to transcend the racial lines and be considered a film worthy of Academy recognition. This being said, Though Goldberg clearly commanded this stellar cast of actors, she was only nominated as ‘Best SUPPORTING Actress’ for her role.
The movie starts out in a lovely field of purple, where two girls are playing. They are playing the stereotypical ‘patty-cake’ game as done by most young children. The bright sun and field of purple help give a since of playfulness and innocence, and as the faces of the children are the only things that are shown, the two run to a clearing where their bodies are exposed, as well as their innocence.. We see that one of the children, Celie is with child. The innocence is immediately taken away, which a fitting seg-way into the next scene is with is dark and dreary, of her giving birth to her child, which is immediately taken away by her father.
The shocking truths do not end there. It just gets worse from this moment on. In the next few things, the story of Celie unfolds. We quickly find out that her child that she had given birth to was her father’s child and sold away to family that was not able to have children. A suitor visits the home, in hopes of marrying Nettie, Celie’s younger and prettier sister, but Celie’s father is non too plus in getting rid of Celie first, and gives his consent to have her married, to a man how did not love her.
Still a teenager now married with Mr. and living in a loveless and abusive marriage, Nettie escapes her father’s incestuous grasps to the new home of Celie only to be propositioned by Mister. I think that the fact that neither Nettie nor Celie ever calls her husband Mister and never says his last name. Alice Walker, author of the book in which the movie is adapted, did a good job in conveying the ominous character development of this role.
Moving on, Nettie thwarts off the sexual advancements of Mister and by way of a dramatic exodus, Nettie is dispelled from Mister’s property, vowing to Celie that nothing but death could keep her from writing her.
Years past, and Celie is still living in disparity and foundering a loveless marriage. She is older now and the scene shows that she has become as accustomed to mister’s idio-sequences as the back of his right had. Mister goes out to check the mail and Celie asks if a letter from her sister had come. With Mister’s response, it is conveyed to the audience that there was no letter from Nettie and that she has never heard from her sister since the day that she was cast away from Mister’s property.
Not until Celie runs into Mister’s equal, and mistress, Suge Avery, did Celie start to take pride in her. Though Mister’s equal, Suge’s love for Celie along with her confident brought out a new Celie that made Mister and a lot of other people stand up and take notice of her. Suge along with, Sophia (played by Oprah Winfrey) teach Celie to love herself and not the situation that she was in.
The confidence of Celie explodes when she finds out the way that Mister has been keeping her sister way from her. I will not tell you how he does this, you are going to have to watch and find out for yourself. It is well worth the couple hours of waiting to see all the years of degradations and oppression is expelled in the direction of Mister over a quiet family dinner.
Depicting yet another riveting exodus, Celie goes on to live the rest of her days as the independent woman that she was destined to be. At the end of the movie her patience and fidelity are rewarded ten fold.
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- Celie goes on to live the rest of her days as the independent woman that she was destined to be. At the end of the movie her patience and fidelity are rewarded ten fold.
