Oscar Night Nominees: Still Searching for the White Knight
by Andrés T. Tapia -
For different reasons I was entertained, challenged, and/or inspired by Avatar, District 9, Precious, and The Blind Side, four of this year’s ten Oscar nominees. Smart script writing, convincing performances, off-the-chain special effects, first-class editing. And I simply loved the first two sci-fi flicks.
So I hate to rain on this parade, but it’s time we name the elephant in the room: what is it with this spate of Hollywood movies that require a member of the majority culture to save us poor people of color from ourselves or others every single time?
In Avatar, it takes one white male who goes rogue to save an entire civilization of classically depicted noble savages from the destructive forces of Western civilization (by the way, not unlike in Disney’s Pocahantas- see that movie’s mashup with Avatar).
CFV 426 – Avatar/Pocahontas Mashup FINAL VERSION from
Randy Szuch on Vimeo.
Turns out that Avatar’s white knight, Jake Sully, a former Marine, can fight harder and smarter in Pandora, an environment — no, a planet– he has never been in before, and not only master the ways of the Na’vi, but actually even surpass them as he becomes only the sixth man ever in the multimillennial-long history of the Na’vi to have tamed a mythical airborne predator referred to as the Great Leonopteryx.
District 9 follows a similar plotline, where another white male, this time a South African police operative, Wikus van de Merwe, also goes rogue to help the alien prauns (this time not depicted as beautifully noble but rather as idiot savants) to escape even greater oppression with obvious links to Apartheid ideology. In both sci-fi pics, the white male heroes become one with their charges through various plot twists as they literally take on the physical forms of the ostracized and oppressed.
In The Blind Side, it takes Sandra Bullock’s Leigh Anne Tuohy, a white Republican Tennessee mother, to see the talent and humanity of African-American Michael Oher, an exceptionally large, strong, and gifted football player, and in the plot twist, despite big gaps in his formal education, more astute academically than those around him thought. Not only does Bullock’s Tuohy rescue and redeem a (yet again) archetypal noble savage, but she does so by cowing the meanest and baddest ‘hood hoods.
Lastly, we have the controversial and excruciating-to-watch Precious,
where
Gabourey Sidibe and Mo’Nique give slamdunk performances in an African American tragedy gasping for redemptive hope. In this film by African American director, Lee Daniels, the white messiah theme is diluted but not erased. The two key redemptive figures in Precious’ life are her alternative school teacher Miss Blu Rain played by Paula Patton and her social worker Miss Weiss played by Mariah Carey. Both actors, Carey and Patton, are half-white. (For more on the controversy this movie stirred in the black community, see this earlier post: “Precious Triggers Heartfelt Debate within Black Community.”)
Furthermore, this salvation message is accentuated by the subliminal theme that a white messiah, even with real or perceived physical or social handicaps — his or her own, or imposed on them by others –is more capable than all the saved peoples combined. Jake, when not galloping like a stallion through his avatar body, is a paraplegic. District 9’s Wikus is painfully incompetent and clueless, and Bullock’s Touhy is a woman in a male Texas sports environment. Even in the 90’s comedy The Three Amigos starring Steve Martin, Chevy Chase, and Martin Short, these bumbling, buffoonish, white male outcasts as smarter and stronger than an entire Mexican village.
And while I recognize that The Blind Side is based on a true story and I don’t want to take away from the accomplishments of the real Ms. Touhy or diminish her real relationship with Oher who is now a Baltimore Ravens offensive tackle, it’s the lack of Hollywood narratives that emphasize self empowerment on the part of marginalized groups that gets tiresome and worrisome.
For example, we’ve seen the homage film Mississippi Burning about white Civil Rights workers getting killed before we have seen a great movie about Martin Luther King, Jr. And we’re still waiting. We do have Spike Lee’s Malcolm X epic, but this black director chose to highlight a black self empowerment leader who was brought down by his own. And where are the equivalent fictional or historic black, Latino and Asian Jakes and Winkus’ and Touhys? Invictus about Nelson Mandela and Gandhi are in that spirit, but note that these are about historical figures outside the US.
This, of course, is not a new phenomenon. It showed up with Kevin Costner in Dances with Wolves and Peter O’Toole in Lawrence of Arabia. And others over time have written about it, most recently in the Racism Review and the New York Times. But the persistence of this narrative is troubling. Not just from a movie watching experience but, more seriously, in how it reinforces a persistent mindset in well intentioned corporate diversity efforts, or in disaster relief efforts such as in Haiti.
For example, here is a wonderfully inspiring, fun, and heart-warming video by grade school students at Hope Christian School in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. No question their white administrators and teachers doing video cameos are truly committed to these kids and are doing genuine affirming work with them. I love this clip in the same way I admire and even relish the movie-going and cultural impact of Oscar nominees Avatar, District 9, The Blind Side, and Precious. But…
…first see the clip and come back:
But… there’s a point when one simply gets tired of always seeing stories of our being saved by white messiahs. It is not good for the majority culture who may be subliminally encouraged to keep taking on this white person’s burden and it’s not good for our communities of color where we are vulnerable to abrogating responsibility to be effective advocates for ourselves without having to have our redemption depend on the kindness of well meaning — and bigger than life — strangers.
Loading... 
I noted with special interest your observation that in at least 2 of the 4 films you discuss, a disabled white person is able to save a whole (other) race. In one case the guy is physically disabled, and in the other case the woman is “disabled” by being a woman in the all-male football arena. It’s as if the producers of these films assume that the average person is only able to deconstruct one stereotype at a time–so in order to put a disabled person or a woman in a position of leadership/power, conceptions about racial others have to stay the same. A net zero gain for diversity? Certainly a loss for racial/ethnic diversity.
It’s easy to criticize but difficult to do so with empathy and compassion. Thanks for this.
Andres,
Another great example of hidden (or maybe not so hidden) cultural bias. This type of mythology is so deeply ingrained in our perceptions of the world that sometimes you are not even aware of it. Thanks for linking these three current movies together in this interesting and timely posting.
Thank you! Thank You! and Thank YOU! I totally agree with your assessment. However, I believe the message are intended because mainstream America tend to want to see the great white hope as the ‘only’ rescurer. So, I guess the challenge is to change these often damaging messages by educating our youth as I have hope in the younger generation! But it’s never to late for the babyboomers!
Very well written, Andres. Your message that the white savior image can be damaging is valid.
Here is an equally valid point of view. As people in a position to be saviors, i.e., people with power and influence, we need role models who use that power and influence to help others who are oppressed because of their race, religion sexual orientation, etc. In fact, in some circumstances we in the majority ought to go to extraordinary lengths, risking our own safety, to help other who are oppressed because of their minority status.
My wife and I were members of a treaty rights support group in Wisconsin in the early 1990s, mostly white people, who took risks to help Chippewa Indians fight for their treaty rights over a period of several years. Finally the Wisconsin Supreme Court restored most of those rights, and the Indians said they couldn’t have done it without us (and the white lawyers who worked for them pro bono). We don’t take all or even most of the credit for that triumph–the Indians showed tremendous courage, diplomacy, spiritual strength, and even Herculean restraint in the face of very ugly attacks by mobs of bigots.
During World War II, when European Jews were being hunted and slaughtered by Nazis and collaborators, many white people took huge risks to help protect Jews from Nazis. Thank you, because those particular Jews couldn’t have survived without their lily-white saviors. Those saviors were the role models for Harriet and me when we helped the Chippewa win their treaty rights.
The most damaging movies are fact-based ones that distort the facts and shift the credit away from the courageous oppressed minorities, as was the case in Mississippi Burning (I didn’t see it, but I read that the white federal agents got more credit than they deserved). But the image of a white individual helping oppressed minorities in itself isn’t damaging if it inspires other majority members to come to the aid of oppressed minorities.
As a white, majority-culture female, I agree with your comments about Avatar. Frankly, it gets cloying to see the “outsider” white male waltz in and save the day. Again.
Andres, I’m so happy you wrote about this! I went to see Avatar with an group of friends of mine, all Anglos (all of whom had already seen the movie once) and walked out if it being the only one who said: “I liked the special effects but I don’t really care for the story line.” They were first shocked by my comment and only after I explained pretty much what you said here, they were able to see it.
Not only the narrative of the white male as the savior of the Na’vi but also the parallel with how America behaves with its “enemies.” We first destroy them in search of or to protect a special energy source and then we are the ones who have to help them figure out their future because they can’t do it on their own.
And in the case of the Na’vi it was also almost funny to see that no matter how different they tried to make this blue people, they still ride “horses” and wear feathers!
Congrats on bringing this issue out!