Tag: Racism

Film Review: To Kill a Mockingbird

If I was allowed just one word to sum up this movie it would be, “beautiful”. For it truly is. I caught it recently on TV (mercifully without those dangerously irritating commercial interruptions), and as the end credits rolled, a feeling of what I can only describe as ‘euphoria for being alive’ came over me. I’m sure you know what I mean – when you behold something so incredibly worthy of our world that it just makes you glad to be here, be it a clear night sky riddled with a billion stars or a toddler’s first steps towards your beckoning arms, smiling a smile that just melts your heart.

What possibly makes the film so beautiful is the way that it’s told through the eyes of six year old Scout Finch (Mary Badham) who, together with her older brother Jem (Phillip Alford), lives in the fictional ‘tired old town’ of Maycomb, Alabama with their widowed father Atticus (Gregory Peck) sometime during the Great Depression.

I shall refrain from giving away too much of the plot but the meat of the story can be divided into two parts. Firstly, the children, together with a visiting boy named Dill Harris (John Megna) who comes to Maycomb every summer to stay with his aunt, are fascinated to learn the truth about one of their neighbours, the mysterious and reclusive ‘Boo’ Radley (played by Robert Duvall in his big screen debut). This involves lots of childish antics like spying through the neighbour’s windows and knocking on their front door then running away to hide. All perfectly charming kid’s stuff and you can’t help but love the little rascals for it.

The second part concerns their father – a town lawyer – and his defence of Tom Robinson (Brock Peters), a black man accused of raping a young white woman. With the action taking place sometime in the 1930s at a time when black people were viewed in the town to be inferior than whites, things basically don’t look good for Tom. But Atticus, who believes that all people should be treated equally and fairly, is determined to seek the truth even if it sets the town against him.

For me, the greatness of the film lies in the way it weaves this second storyline (which even though it’s the business of the adults, we, the audience, still receive via the eyes and ears of Scout) so seamlessly with the first. And it’s this innocent person’s perspective of not fully comprehending the reason why things are happening the way they are, that gives the film its power. Racism really doesn’t make any sense.

Of course, such greatness on screen is born out of great writing and To Kill a Mockingbird is Harper Lee’s 1961 Pulitzer Prize winning novel. The book itself is a masterpiece and has since become a modern classic of American literature and Robert Mulligan (director) together with Horton Foote (screenwriter) did one of the best jobs in the history of cinema of turning a novel into a film.

Foote won the Oscar for his screenplay and Peck won the only Oscar of his long and distinguished career for his sublime portrayal of Atticus Finch. The film’s third and final Oscar win was for its Black and White Art Direction-Set Direction. There were five more nominations for it at the 1963 Academy Awards including Best Picture (Alan J. Pakula), Best Supporting Actress (Mary Badham – who at 10 years old held the record for the youngest nominee in this category until Tatum O’Neal won for Paper Moon in 1973), Best Director (Mulligan), Best Cinematography (Russell Harlan) and Best Music Score (Elmer Bernstein). Bernstein’s music is effortlessly moving and the black and white cinematography serves well at placing the film in the time it was set. Of course, there are numerous other awards and honours the film has garnered over the years and to list them would require more space than I have here but perhaps the most significant is this –

The American Film Institute named Atticus Finch the greatest movie hero of the 20th Century. I find this quite remarkable when you think of all the gun-toting, macho types that typify a movie hero these days. Well deserved of the honour he is too. And well deserved was Peck’s Oscar. According to IMDB, he nailed his 9 minute summation speech in one take and if you’ve seen it, you’ll know it’s a seminal courtroom monologue.

On second thoughts, maybe my one word to sum this film up would be, “perfect”. For in cinematic terms, that’s what it is. But there’s been so much praise about this film since its release in December 1962 that a few more words from me mean very little. Therefore, I will let one of the film’s original tag lines have the last word.

If you have read the novel, you will relive every treasured moment…If not, a deeply moving experience awaits you!

It’s Meant to be the Beautiful Game – Let’s Try to Keep it That Way

I find it very hard to feel sympathetic for footballers.  But the image of A.C. Milan’s Kevin-Prince Boateng rifling the ball into the stands, ripping his shirt off, and storming off the pitch (the rest of his teammates in tow) in his club’s match against Pro Patria was certainly a poignant one.  “I don’t care what game it is,” Boateng said defiantly, “a friendly, Italian league or Champions’ League match – I would walk off again.”

So what on earth had got up his nose?  Along with three other black players on the Milan team, Boateng had been subjected to racist chants from a section of opposition supporters.  His decision to put an end to the abuse by putting an end to the match was praised by other players across the globe, but was it justified?

Clarence Seedorf doesn’t think so.  The well-respected Dutch midfielder seemed to characterise Boateng’s response as immature: “I don’t see it as such a positive thing because [it] empowers more and more of this behaviour,” he observed.  And his argument has an enticing logic to it.  By enabling hooligans to cause the disruption they so crave, we show the minority that they have the power spoil the game for everyone else.  Far better, says Seedorf, to boot out the offending faction and carry on playing.

The question is not whether racism (or, for that matter, any other form of abuse) has a place in stadia, but whether players have a right to take matters into their own hands if nothing is done about it.  Ever since the rightly ridiculed Michel Platini, UEFA President, threatened Mario Balotelli with a booking if he refused to put up with racist hollers from the crowd at Euro 2012, there’s been a fair amount of controversy over the issue – not least because of Sepp Blatter’s gaffe six months earlier when he told players that on-field racism should be resolved with a handshake.  (Why hadn’t anyone else thought of that?)

In fact, at almost every level, football’s governing bodies have failed to tackle racism.  Just compare UEFA’s initial £65,000 fine on Serbia following persistent abuse of some of England’s Under-21s last October, to the £80,000 that Nicklas Bendtner was forced to dish out after revealing his branded boxer shorts after scoring at Euro 2012.  And no, you didn’t misread that.  Oh, and what about the paltry £65,000 the Croatian FA was charged after racial abuse at Euro 2012?  Or the £32,500 that Lazio shelled out for anti-Semitic jeering at Tottenham fans in September?  Or John Terry’s mystifying escape (with just a £220,000 fine and a four match ban), like a cat with nine lives, from the Anton Ferdinand incident?

The simple question is this: why are footballing institutions so reluctant to act?  It’s a question that never gets answered.  At least we’re not in Russia, where both Christopher Samba and Roberto Carlos have been offered bananas by fans.  Zenit St Petersburg’s biggest supporters’ group (called Landscrona) was responsible for one of the most horrendous sporting stories of 2012: they went completely unpunished for writing a manifesto making the oh-so-reasonable request that the club recruit no more non-white or gay players – please.  The multi-million pound signings of two black players who were “forced down Zenit’s throat” had broken “an important tradition that underlines the team’s identity”.  And gay footballers?  Well, they’re just “unworthy of our great city”.  Evidently.

But don’t be fooled into thinking everything’s dandy over here.  English football isn’t immune to racism, even if the problems lie just beneath the surface.  It still shocks me that only three of the 88 managers listed by the LMA are black.  The imbalance is uncomfortable, to say the least.  Indeed, the very fact that two of the most high-profile in-game incidents of racism – involving Luis Suarez and John Terry – in Premier League history took place just last season is extremely telling.

Given all the evidence, it’s hard to accept Seedorf’s cynical view of Boateng’s stand.  It was one that has long since needed to be made – and one that must continue to be made until the establishment makes some serious changes.  As Reading striker Jason Roberts noted, “until the authorities take appropriate action and start taking this issue seriously, this battle will have to be fought by the players.”  It’s by no means ideal, but for as long as footballing bodies refuse to clamp down on every kind of abuse, there seems to be no other option – an ugly situation to be in, in a game now drowning in cash but thirsting for morality.

Put yourself in the boots of Kevin-Prince Boateng, the ball at your feet as thugs behind you whoop and holler.  “Imagine yourself,” as Fifpro’s anti-racism spokesman, Tony Higgins, does, “at work and someone standing right next to you is constantly insulting you in the worst way possible.  Would you accept that?”

I know I wouldn’t.