The Last Damn Post I'm Writing About Tyler Perry

"If I don't like it, I don't like it. That don't mean that I'm hatin..." - Common

Ok...watch the video...

Done?

Good.

I am so damn sick of people trying to convince me that Tyler Perry is God's gift to black film making...

Tyler Perry may quite possibly be the worst black film maker in the history of major motion picture productions, yet black people en masse eat this stuff up. Why?

"Tyler Perry puts black actors to work..."

So in 2011, with a black president, we're supposed to accept subpar film making because black actors are working? So, his employing of black actors is a reason to overlook is obvious directorial deficiencies?

You need more people...

"Tyler Perry has a great message with his movies..."

Prayer in a film does not make a good message...

A little bit later I'm going to talk about the messages that Tyler Perry sends that most of us conveniently ignore when watching his films. (Some of you will probably be too pissed off to make it to that point...which proves you're incapable of rationally critiquing his films...carry on...)

"Black people always want to criticize another black man. Crabs in a barrel..."

Oh really? That's your argument? So because I support black actors and film makers on the regular and don't support Tyler Perry, I'm a crab now? Let me ask you a couple of questions then...

Have you ever watched a bootleged Tyler Perry production? If your answer is "yes", then you've officially become a crab because you took money out of that man's pocket.

Did you criticize Halle Berry for having a sex scene with Billy Bob Thornton in Monster's Ball? If you answered "yes" you not only criticized a black actress but you criticized a black film maker (Lee Daniels) as well.

Have you ever criticized any of the following hip hop artists: Soulja Boy, Waka Flocka Flames, Nicki Minaj, Lil' Wayne?

If your answer is "yes," then judging by YOUR standards...you're one of the crabs in the barrel...

Feel free to sit down now...

More after the break...














So...lets analyze for a second exactly what it is about Tyler Perry's films that irk the hell out of me...

The first thing that confuses me and bothers me is the apparent embracing of victimization that many of Tyler Perry's female characters indulge in.

I know black women who've been cheated on, lied to, victimized, and brutalized. Some of them are truly sad and deplorable stories and situations. Some are caused by the actions of a man. Some are caused by the decisions made by the woman. Some are a hybrid of both. None the less, in EVERY Tyler Perry movie I've watched, there is a black woman there who wears her dismal situation and victimization almost like a badge of honor. She lies in the filth of victimization until either a) the love of some random man lifts her out, b) some religious rhetoric causes her to see the err of her ways, or c) a combination of both.

Now, this actually brings up another point. Why is it that a man has to save this "victimized" woman from herself? Why is it that women who watch these films don't see how the films in and of themselves a) glorify a patriarchal damn near schauvinistic view of society, b) paint them as helpless victims, and c) are the most unrealistic shit I've ever seen on a screen in my life.

Here's another question for those of you that haven't cursed me out yet and decided that I'm just a freaking Tyler Perry hater. Why do the source of most of the problems in the character's lives originate with a man or male influences? Its this kind of character/gender role schizophrenia that bothers me.

Men are the root of the "issues" that many of these characters face yet somehow a man is responsible for resolving these issues as the victimized woman somehow recognizes her own internal victory through the strength of a man and his love of God and her unwavering faith that she didn't necessarily have until she met a man. HUH?!

There's one last thing that bothers me though...

Some of you will try to crucify me for it but I don't really care...

There is an almost blatant sense of homo eroticism in a number of Tyler Perry's films. Look at the way many of the male characters are made up in the films. Michael Jai White has more makeup on than any of his female cast mates in Why Did I Get Married? and Why Did I Get Married Too? In his rendition of For Colored Girls... he made Janet Jackson's husband a closeted gay man to add a bit of salaciousness to a story that needed none.

I'm not going to touch him dressing as a woman because honestly, believe it or not, that's not a valid argument here for me...

More after the break...














Here's the big thing though folks...I don't dislike Tyler Perry...

I watch Tyler Perry's plays for the same reason I listen to Gucci Mane and Plies...I don't want to be deep or intellectual all the time. I want to sit back and just laugh, and I'm not ashamed to admit that watching a Madea Stage Play occasionally makes me laugh.

I think Tyler Perry's a MUCH better playwright than he is a film director. I think his plays, and for the most part his films, are perfect for the stage. I think his plays are an integral part of black theater, believe it or now. I think Tyler Perry is playing a pivotal role in keeping the system that fed so many black folks for generations. That system is "The Chitlin Circuit"...the network of small and mid-size areas that supported independent black talent for generations.

I admire Tyler Perry for his hustle. I take pride in the fact that this black man came up from literally NOTHING and now owns his own studio and at the snap of a finger can make a movie happen. THAT is amazing to me folks...it really is.

So why do his films bother me? Its two fold...I've already given you the aesthetic part...Now I'll give you another bit of it...

After the break...













First off, I'm annoyed by Tyler Perry's blatant disregard for the criticism lobbied against him. He should expect that and handle it better rather than being arrogant and purposely misdirecting the criticism.

(Here's an idea!!! Take a damn film class!)

As bad as it hurts to say it, he could take a lesson in handling criticism from Waka Flocka Flames....stop laughing...

When Method Man completely ripped Waka's style, Mr. Flames simply replied that he thought Meth was disrespecting his own. How could he not consider "I Came To Bring The Pain" as crunk muzik? How could he not consider his contemporaries Onyx to be in the same vein?

Damn...

He completely disarmed a number of critics with that one...

Perry on the other hand thinks its about black film makers not wanting to show a certain segment of black life. Perry's idea there is pure and utter bullshit. There have been a number of movies that have spoken to the experience of working class black folks. His most vocal critic Spike Lee having made a couple of them (See: Do The Right Thing, Crooklyn, etc.)

Rather than handle the criticism gracefully he gets high minded and gets all offended. Yeah...way to handle it.

Secondly, I'm made at us...

Who's us? THE ENTIRE BLACK MOVIE WATCHING COMMUNITY.

Most of us run to a Tyler Perry film, but turn around and ignore films like The Night Catches Us, Blood Done Signed My Name, and many others...

I don't get it...I really don't...We defend Tyler Perry because he's a black man and then ignore other black film makers because may challenge us as well as entertain us?

I originally was excited about Ntozake Shange's choreopoem "For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When The Rainbow Is Enuff" being adapted for the big screen. Halfway through Tyler Perry's rendition I wanted to throw up. The power that the women had displayed so prominently in the poem had been stripped from them in Tyler Perry's patented way of making black women victims. When I finally did sit down to finish it I realized that the conclusion was anticlimactic and damn near disrespectful to the internalization of strength that these women characters had come to symbolize in the choreopoem.

When I talked about how disappointed I was, I was met with a number of angry responses...I asked each person if they'd read the book and was met with either a "No" or "Damn, there's a book?"

*sigh*

I'm exhausted with this topic because more than likely I'm talking to a brick wall...

In closing let me say...support your independent black filmmakers...