Identity and Authenticity in Malcolm and Marie
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Malcolm hates identity and authenticity in filmmaking, Marie defends it. How big of a role do they really play?
How does Identity Impact Content?
From Moonlight, to BlacKKKlansman to the surge of foreign films in Portrait of a Lady on Fire and Parasite, representation in the filmmaking industry is at the highest that it has ever been. As the entertainment industry becomes more diverse, the rules regarding which people are “allowed” to create which types of content has been blurred. Some of the films and characters that were socially acceptable are no longer so, because of the recent development of representation and its impact on characters and stories. People have come to realize that stories feel more real when there is a basis of reality in them, which comes from experience by the people who are creating them.
Brokeback Mountain, a film about a cowboy and a ranch hand’s gay love affair, was originally written by Annie Proulx, adapted by Larry McMurtry, and directed by Ang Lee, none of whom are part of the LGBTQ+ community themselves. The lead actors of the film, Jake Gyllenhaal and Heath Ledger, aren’t gay either. None of the people who are majorly involved with the writing or production of the film are able to bring any life experience to the film, and while this makes it no less impactful, it is less authentic. Although Brokeback Mountain is a fictional situation, and not meant to imitate true events, there are aspects of all films that will inevitably reflect real life; in this case, it’s the fact that the men cannot reveal their relationship because of homophobia. Having people that have experienced homophobia (i.e. LGBTQ+ people) would help to make the movie more realistic in that specific aspect, and make for a better viewing experience, especially for people in the LGBTQ+ community.
Compare Brokeback Mountain (2005) to Carol (2015). Merely ten years apart, but in those ten years there have been major steps made toward not only on-screen inclusivity but also representation behind the scenes. Carol is adapted from the 1952 novel The Price of Salt by Patricia Highsmith, a lesbian woman. The film’s director, Todd Haynes, is gay. The actress who played the supporting character Abby Gerhard, Sarah Paulson, has no label on her sexuality, but is in a five year relationship with Holland Taylor. The involvement of LGBTQ+ people in the production of the film is what makes it more authentic. This concept can be applied when the cast and crew involves anyone of a marginalized identity, whether it be race, gender, religion, sexuality, or otherwise.
It’s important to note that this is in no way a restriction to who can create which types of content, but as identity, especially intersectional identity, is beginning to play a larger role, it is important to acknowledge how and why it is doing so. Intersectional identity is the relationship of the social categorizations (race, gender, sexuality, etc.) that form a person’s identity. If any part of a person’s intersectional identity is considered to be marginalized, such as being a person of colour, being a woman or non-binary, or being LGBTQ+, they are considered to be a minority, and will likely face systemic disadvantages because of it. White, cisgendered, heterosexual men have very little marginalization in their intersectional identity, and aren’t able to bring the lived experience that a woman, person of colour, or LGBTQ+ person would be able to bring to a story about women, people of colour, or LGBTQ+ people. The lived experience of these people is authenticity, and it’s important to audiences that authenticity is heard and seen on the silver screen.
Identity in Malcolm and Marie
Malcolm and Marie is characterized by the isolation of its titular characters, the stylistic choice of shooting on black and white 35mm film, and the close-up, continuous cinematography. It was released on Netflix on February 5th, 2021, and has received mixed reviews since: the performances of John David Washington as Malcolm and Zendaya as Marie have been widely praised while Sam Levinson’s screenplay has been criticized.
Levinson’s writing seems not to give a voice to frustrated Black filmmakers like Malcolm, or people who are underrepresented in the film industry like Marie, although it would have been a perfect opportunity. If he had written Malcolm’s monologues to point out how race plays a role in analyzing Black art through a white lens, he would have made a valid point, and one that would be appropriate for him to make as a white man. Instead, Levinson chooses to attempt another social commentary, this time about his perceived overimportance of identity in the entertainment industry.
Both the character of Malcolm and Sam Levinson himself are adamant that their films are not “Black” films, they are films that happen to star Black people, however, Malcolm as a Black filmmaker and Sam Levinson as a white filmmaker saying this have different effects. Malcolm airs his grievances to Marie, saying, “But what was interesting is you could see that because I’m Black and the movie stars a Black woman she was already trying to frame it through a political lens.” He is fed up with his identity as a Black man being used to justify the politicization of any media that he creates, even when it isn’t intended to be political. He also later says that he is a filmmaker, and he wants to be part of a larger conversation about filmmaking without always having white writers making it about race. His frustration is understandable, but feels unnatural, in part due to the specificity of Levinson’s writing.
Malcolm’s frustration is an extension of writer/director Sam Levinson’s frustration at being “unable” to tell Black and LGBTQ+ stories, particularly in reference to the negative reception of his 2018 film Assassination Nation, which addresses topics such as racism, sexism, homophobia, and transphobia in the opening montage. Malcolm’s targeted jabs at “the white woman from the LA Times” are likely references to Katie Walsh, who wrote a negative review of Assassination Nation, calling it, “a badly bungled attempt at social commentary.” This is a deliberate decision by Levinson: shifting Malcolm’s voice from a Black filmmaker’s to his own white voice. He had Malcolm condemn the white male writers from Variety and Indiewire- to an extent, he actually pointed out that they loved it- but as soon as he criticizes “the white girl from the LA Times,” what would have been a clear example of misogyny coming from a white man is now hidden under the fallacious guise of Black frustration. Levinson’s thinly veiled personal pettiness only serves to weaken Malcolm’s already weak attack on the importance of identity and authenticity.
When Sam Levinson vents his frustration at politicization of Black films, it isn’t because he’s being praised solely for his identity over his creation, as Malcolm seems to be. It’s because when Black and LGBTQ+ films are politicized, Levinson, as a straight white man, is prevented from major involvement because he lacks the identity of those marginalized groups to make it authentic. Levinson believes that as the industry becomes more exclusive in who can and cannot create specific types of content (especially the political commentaries that he so loves) he will be excluded, because he does not have the lived experience that may soon be a prerequisite to create such content. He is not a person of colour, nor is he gay, transgender, female, nonbinary, nor virtually any other marginalized intersectional identity, and thus does not have the experience of any of these identities. His attempt to combat this is not to accept that there is some content that he should not create, but to vent his white frustration through a Black actor playing a Black filmmaker, which comes off as a feeble attempt to keep himself in the conversation.
However, Malcolm does make good points about the lens of race through which these white writers are seeing the film. In the review of the woman from the LA Times, she states that Malcolm, “carefully, brilliantly subverts the white savior trope…” Malcolm is upset at the statement, because, although it’s praise, he sees it as being inaccurate, because the critic analyzed the film as a Black film by a Black filmmaker. He benefits from this double standard, but would rather not. “She says that I brilliantly subvert the white savior trope? She is a savior. She is trying to save her. So how did I subvert it? You know how… by being black. Because if I was white, she would have said I fell for the trope.” It seems as if he would rather receive criticism as a white filmmaker than praise as a Black filmmaker, because he doesn’t want his identity to affect the reception of his content.
Malcolm also addresses the criticism of the male gaze in his film. The white lady from the LA Times makes her return, saying that, “One begins to question his intention in reveling in the trauma of his Black female heroine for so long,” as Malcolm reads her review aloud. Glorifying and sexualizing traumatic events for women is a common occurrence in film and television. It’s difficult to avoid because it’s so common, and Malcolm seems to fall into the trap by leaving his lead character nude in the traumatic scene. “But because I’m a man, she can question my intentions, saying I’m reveling in the trauma of a woman… Better implied than depicted. What? Cause Taylor has her shirt off.” Ironically, Levinson makes the same mistake, in having Zendaya in a revealing dress or tank top for the entirety of the film.
This is where Levinson’s writing strays from its powerful message of the lens of race, into the rejection of identity: “You can’t hang everything on identity. Identities are constantly shifting… What drives an artist? What drives a filmmaker?” He questions whether his choices would have been received differently if he had been white, if he had been gay, if he had been a woman, and ultimately comes to the conclusion that it doesn’t matter, and that making it matter is, “Inhibiting the ability for artists to dream about what life might be like for someone else.” Levinson’s writing is meant to reject identity, to reject authenticity; he begs for people to appreciate art as art without accounting for the artist.
Levinson, as a white man, tries to insert himself into the shoes of a Black filmmaker complaining about identity, which makes the character one-dimensional and, in true anti-Malcolm fashion, unauthentic. As the white son of Barry Levinson- legendary director of Rain Man and Diner- his writing reeks of privilege. Hopefully this time, he’ll learn his lesson: when the worst thing to happen to you is a bad review, don’t make a film exploiting Black characters to complain about it.
