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The Color Purple

A classic to be enjoyed today for its emphasis on inequality.

The Color Purple (1985)

Grade: A

Director: Steven Spielberg (Jaws)

Screenplay: Menno Meyjes (Lionheart) from Alice Walker novel

Cast: Danny Glover (Lethal Weapon), Whoppi Goldberg (Ghost)

Rating: PG-13

Runtime: 2h 34m

By: John DeSando

Celie (Whoppi Goldberg): [on leaving, shouting to Albert (Danny Glover)] "I'm poor, black, I might even be ugly, but dear God, I'm here. I'm here."

No one can doubt that The Color Purple (1985) deserved 11 Oscar nominations. It is hard and soft, depressing and uplifting, a classic that turns the fraught experience of Blacks in the South of the early 20th century into an exhilarating history of hope. But with a different point of view.

Few directors other than Steven Spielberg, a white man of universal sensitivities, could make a movie as gritty with the unrelenting Black patriarchy imprisoning its women until they can take it no more. Like the stunning purple flowers of the girls’ early years, the spirit of the film rises above their abuse into a hope tempered by rough reality.

Celie and Sophia (Oprah Winfrey) do the heavy lifting earning their Oscars and cementing their reputations as gifted entertainers. The abuse Albert (Danny Glover) gives to Celie is over the top but probably true to the times.

Note that the horrific treatment of women comes from Black males, a point of view almost counter intuitive to our usual take on the White vs. Black experience. As Celie says to Albert: “You a low-down dirty dog, that's what's wrong. Time for me to get away from you, and enter into Creation. And your dead body'd be just the welcome mat I need.”

That point of view makes the male chauvinism of the time a democratic reality as it shows how long it took for women to achieve equality regardless of race.

John DeSando, a Los Angeles Press Club first-place winner for National Entertainment Journalism, hosts WCBE’s It’s Movie Time and co-hosts Cinema Classics. Contact him at JohnDeSando62@gmail.com.

John DeSando holds a BA from Georgetown University and a Ph.D. in English from The University of Arizona. He served several universities as a professor, dean, and academic vice president. He has been producing and broadcasting as a film critic on It’s Movie Time and Cinema Classics for more than two decades. DeSando received the Los Angeles Press Club's first-place honors for national entertainment journalism.