A Film Analysis of the Relationships Between Black People in America and the racial injustice they experience in society among Queen and Slim
Currently, there are movements such as BlacklivesMatter, BlackGirlMagic, Back to Africa occurring right now in society aiming to educate people against violence and systemic racism. This is where they all come together but struggle as one unit because of their identity. There are wide ranges of racial tensions between them. With the growing difference within the black communities, their problem stems from historical events.The film Queen and Slim showed the harsh reality for blacks in America. The harsh reality that it makes no difference if you believe in God or don’t, have a job or have a career, love your family, pay your taxes. All that matters is the skin that makes you a threat to society. Police brutality is a way to create fear in African Americans in America. Which helped me conclude my research question to be on how the Relationships Between Black People in America and the racial injustice they experience in society among Queen and Slim ?
Defensible
Literature Analysis: History that Uprise the Tension
The history of slavery in 1619 was the main cause of the isolation from black people and other ethniticies. According to Jennifer V Jackson (2003), she observed that the communication problems between Africans and African Americans are blamed based on the history of slavery, its divisiveness, and conquer. Black people were set up against each other and told not to associate with one another because of the negative attributes. They both were blinded by the racial killing, and genocide. According to Sarah Pruitt (2016), a writer for History, there were about 3.6 percent of Africans who were shipped to the caribbeans. Among the 1.2 million of the Africans, 50 percent of the Africans came from Slave coast (Ghana, Ivory coast) and rest from countries like Nigeria, Congo, and Cameroon (Pruitt 2016). Where many left large African kingdoms like the Ashanti kingdom, Oyo, Benin, and Dahomey. African Slaves were seen as dirty savages and not in the same social class as white people. Slaves were brutally whipped, hanged, raped and shot. After slavery was banned, blacks and whites were segragated because of the jim crow law. African American were still treated badly even though they were free from slavery. .
Now in the 21 century, Police brutality is another form of racial discrimation that African Americans are experiencing. According to Leonard Moore” interactions between African Americans and urban police departments were initially shaped by the Great Migration (1916–70) of African Americans from the rural South into urban areas of the North and West, especially following World War II” (Britannic). In 2019, African American are 3 times more likely to be killed by police than white people and 1.4 times more likely to be unarmed compared to white people (Mappingpolicevilence). In society, ethnicity is grouped up as a whole, specifically in most applications in the background section, they ask for people’s ethnicity: American Indian or Alaska Native, Asian, Black or African American, Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander, and White. This might be problematic because the titles are vague on one’s identity. Queen and Slim explains how racial injustice occurs in society.
Method section:
I will be conducting an analysis on the film Queen and Slim, directed by Melina Matsoukas and written by Lena Withe. This film created is a 2019 American romantic crime drama film about a black man and woman named Queen and Slim. In society, specifically in the United States many stereotypes are holding Black Americans from living their life; specifically, causing social, emotional, economic, and political problems. The racial discrimination toward African American is mostly known by a large range of people. In the Eurocentric world, Black people are always considered as one race. As long as they are black in America they are stigmatized by society. Some limitations of my project are not being able to survey actual people who watched Queen and Slim and see their opinion and if they agree with my results. Another imitation is that I might have an unbiased opinion because I haven’t actually experienced racial discrimanation yet. I will be analyzing 4 sections of the movie: Beginning, Middle, love making scene and resolution. I would also look at the film choice of clothing, music, setting, and the character.
FIGURE 1: The Tinder date
This is the opening scene where we meet Queen and Slim. They are on their first Tinder date together which is awkward and unsuccessful. Queen is a criminal defense attorney with a bossy, bolshy, and ambitious personality. Slim is religious and nonchalant in this movie. He has a cross necklace and wears it everywhere. Queen tells Slim the only reason she called for the date was because she didn’t want to be home alone. In this scene, the mood is kind of hostile and gloomy but calm at the same time.
FIGURE 2: Police Stop
FIGURE 3: Police Stop
The unsuccessful date is over and Slim drives Queen home. They start to have a positive vibe. On the way, a police siren going off and a white police officer steps out. The officer asks for Slim to step out. Knowing he is a black male, he steps out with his hands out. Queen being a criminal defense attorney intervened, making the situation increase with her sarcasm and questions. The police point a gun at Slim. The police and Queen started to argue and shoots Queen in the leg. As the situation spirals, Slim kills the officer in self-defense. Both of them end up having to run away because they know they would get in trouble.
FIgure 4: The Bar Scene
When they ran away, they went to Queens uncle’s house. Her uncle made Queen cut her hair and gave both Queen and slim new clothes to wear. Queen uncle gave them a car to drive so that no one would know who they are. At this moment, a civilian had caught a video of the shooting between the police and them and leaked the video. There is a serious manhunt for both Queen and Slim. The problem here is that both of them are innocent. The police were racist and were already going to either kill Slim or arrest him. As Queen and Slim leave their uncle early in the morning, they stop at a bar to relax. While they are both trying to stay on the downlow, the bartender recognizes them and gives them a smile. Everyone in the bar knew who they were. They all supported them and understood why they shot the police officer. This scene in Figure # symbolizes peace. At this moment, Queen and Slim were allowed to enjoy themselves together for the first time with no worries.
Figure 5: The protest
This scene was the most powerful scene in the whole movie. One their journey to leave America, they meet Junior and his dad. Junior is one of their fans and a huge activist. Junior is a young teen boy who believes in Black live matter. Junior joins a Blacklivesmatter protest. While Queen & Slim make love in a car, Junior confronts a Black police officer during the protest. Junior pulls a gun on the black officer and then impulsively shoots him in the face. Junior then gets shot by other police officers. Junior was bravefully wrong for pulling out a gun and killing a police officer. His main purpose was because he wants to be remembered in the same way they’ll be remembered. This scene shows “It is the most jarring, mind bogglingly terrible sequence of events. It’s a sequence that is completely devoid of any understanding of Black children who are forced to grow up in a world teeming with state-sanctioned violence. “ However Junior’s way of being remembered was bad. His crime seems as he is a“fame-hungry Black teen who commits an act of violence against someone who looks like him”(Court Danee).
In Figure 6: Slim and Queen almost got caught at this white family house. The house went completely on lockdown. Helicopters and police everywhere. One of the noisy neighbors ratted them out to the police. The only way for them to escape is through the back yard but there is a police officer walking around the backyard. Fortunately for them the police officer was black. The police officer risked his job to help them escape the lockdown. After the escape, they head to their final destination.
This man set them both up to their death. This last scene shows how your own people would expose you when you need them the most. This is why not a lot of black people are successful because we always put each other down for our own needs. This man clearly knew they were innocent and the only way to escape is through him. He exposed them for money.
In the last scene, this is when both Queen and slim die in love with each other and disappointed. Helicopters, police cars are everywhere and they shoot both of them. This scene was unaccepted. They were unarmed but still seen as dangerous criminals. This shows how life is never happy for colored people.
Queen and Slim aims to inform people about black people’s struggle. Trayvon Martin, Sandra Bland, Walter L Scott, Tamir Rice, Micheal Brown, Eric Garner, and many more African American have been killed because of police brutality. There are many protests, movies and even documentaries showing how the American system is corrupt. Almost more than half of the police officers were sent free as innocent.There has been many ryroits, protests, and speeches given to make America aware of what’s occurring. Connected to this film, we are currently in a pandemic where everyone has to stay 6 feet away from each other and should stay indoors. This coronavirus pandemic led to an increase of discrimantionl. The weather in NYC was hot and people decided to go outside. There were white people crowded at a park with no mask. The police welcomed them with open hands and free masks and gloves. While in Brooklyn, many African Americans were stopped by the police because they were not practicing the social distance rule. Close to my home, a group of African American men were tackled to the ground and arrested just because they were standing outside their home. There was a huge amount of people posting videos and photos on social media comparing how the police treated the African American and the white people that same day. Its hard to change how society function because of the discrimination toward ones skin color. Minorities can’t even take a jog or buy food at a store without a problem or even getting killed. Other films that share the same messages of racial discrimination in the police system are like The Hate U Give, and BlacKkKlansman. They compare and contrast how the films touch on the issue of police brutality and discrimination on Blacks people in America. One documentary that’s on Netflix that uncovered the hidden secret of mass incarceration is the 13th. 13th proves how incarceration is another form of slavery for minorities. In order to fight to prevent any more police brutality people need to continue to use social media, it has a huge impact on getting this right.
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