by Nicole F.
Recently there has been a huge boom in movies featuring actors and actresses of color and it couldn’t have happened at a better time. For a long time, Hollywood has been notorious for its whitewashing of ethnic characters, from the blatant racism of Breakfast at Tiffany’s Mr. Yunioshi to the more subtle whitewashing of the Death Note ‘re-imagining.' While there has been a rise of movies starring mostly African American actors, there are some movies that seemed to have flown under the radar that I think should definitely be on your ‘need to watch' list. So here are five movies that deserve the spotlight.
1. BlacKkKlansman
The true and very interesting story of the first African American detective on the Colorado Springs Police Department, Ron Stallworth (played by John David Washington). In the 1970s Stallworth wanted to make a name for himself and he decided to do this by, wait for it, infiltrating and exposing the Klu Klux Klan. If that doesn’t already draw you in, I don’t know what will. The movie follows Stallworth and Flip Zimmerman (played by Adam Driver) as they attempt to take down the extremist hate group from the inside.
This movie is at the very top of my ‘to watch’ list and it should be on everyone’s! The movie was produced by the same team who produced Get Out and the moment I saw that I was sold. The premise just made it climb even higher on my list. With all of the chaos and the rise of hate groups, I feel like this movie couldn’t come at a better time. It’s a great reminder of the past and why it should never be repeated.
2. Crazy Rich Asians
Picture this, a rom-com with an all Asian cast, based in an Asian country, and featuring a ton of Asian culture. That is Crazy Rich Asians. The movie is about a woman named Rachel Chu (played by Constance Wu) accompanying her longtime boyfriend, Nicholas Young (played by Henry Golding) to his best friend’s wedding in Singapore. Little does Rachel know, she is about to be thrust into a world of literal crazy rich Asians.
The movie is based on the book by the same name, which I read and loved earlier this year, and is the first Hollywood movie to feature an all Asian cast in TWENTY-FIVE YEARS! It’s also one of the only movies featuring an all Asian cast that doesn’t feature martial arts. Asian Americans are often one of the most underrepresented cultures in American cinema so for a movie like this to come out, and do as well as it has been doing, is literally groundbreaking. I’m hoping it’s just the start of a trend of seeing more Asian Americans featured in media.
3. To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before
Continuing with movies featuring Asian American characters we have To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before. This movie follows Lara Jean (played by Lana Condor) a young Korean American girl, who writes a love letter to all of her crushes and then puts them in a box, never to be touched again. When she writes a letter to her older sister’s ex boyfriend and all of the letters get mailed out, we follow Lara Jean as she tries to avoid her sister’s ex by pretending to date another one of her former crushes Peter Kavinsky (played by Noah Cintineo).
This movie was probably one of the cutest movies I have seen all year. The movie was based on the book of the same name, which I highly recommend if you’re in the mood for something cute and fluffy, and was released on Netflix in August. That’s right, you don’t even have to buy a ticket for this one! If you have Netflix, you have no excuse. This movie made me laugh, cry, and just gave me all of the warm fuzzy feels I could ever want. It has a great family dynamic and the leads do an incredible job of making their relationship feel real. For a little extra diversity, the movie even features an African American gay character named Lucas (played by Trezzo Mahoro).
4. Love, Simon
Do you want feels? Do you want a relatable story? Do you want to see real emotion? Do you want to see teens talking about the struggle of coming out for the first time? Then you absolutely need to watch this movie! The movie is about Simon (played by Nick Robinson), a closeted gay teenager, as he attempts to maneuver through high school without anyone finding out his secret. When someone from his school makes an anonymous post online coming out as gay, Simon begins emailing him in an attempt to share some of his own feelings with someone he knows won’t judge him.
Based on the book Simon vs the Homosapiens Agenda, this movie is one of the first teen movies about what it’s like to come out of the closet. I know this movie came out earlier in the year, but I still feel like not enough people were talking about it. When I saw this movie in theaters and was able to see the reaction people had to it, it was hard for me not to get emotional. There were scenes that had people cheering in the theater and other scenes that left most of the audience in tears. When the movie had finished and the lights went up, some people even applauded. Gay or straight, I think this movie is worth seeing.
5. The Hate U Give
This is a movie that has yet to come out, but I already can tell that not enough people know about it. The movie is about Starr (played by Amandla Stenberg), a young African American girl struggling to navigate her life at home, where she lives in a poor black community and her life at school, with the rich white kids. After attending a party, Starr witnesses her childhood friend Khalil (played by Algee Smith) being shot and killed by the police. This brings Starr right in the middle of the reality of police brutality and the Black Lives Matter movement, and as she is pressured by all sides of the community to find her voice and speak for what is right.
I read this book back when it came out February of last year and it was a very eye opening experience. Along with tackling the Black Lives Matter movement, the book also takes a hard look at white privilege, stereotypes, and casual racism. As a white woman, I have been typically unaware of the struggles people like Starr have gone through and reading this book really made me much more aware so that I could be a better ally. The Hate U Give is a book I would love to see taught in schools as required reading. If the movie is anything like the book, then I know that watching it will be an amazing experience. So please, on October 19th, give this movie the love it deserves and make its opening week amazing.
So those are the five movies I feel everyone should be watching. Diversity in Hollywood is such a rarity and the only thing that’s going to make it more commonplace is if they see those movies making money and making an impact. If Hollywood knows people will watch them, they will make more movies featuring actors of color, openly non-binary characters, and gay characters. If we want more movies like the ones above we need to support the diverse movies coming out and show our support by buying tickets and seeing the movies in theaters. Show Hollywood that we want more diversity in our films instead of seeing the same twenty white actors playing every role.