"I'll Stay With Him!"Razumikhin Exclaimed. "I Shan't Turn My Back On Him For A Second, And To Hell With

FANTASTIC MR. FOX (2009), dir. Wes Anderson

It worked. You're here. The Bear, S03E10

Queerness, Gentrification and Cultural Genocide in the film La Mission

This is an essay I wrote as part of my pursuit of an Ethnic Studies degree at Cal State East Bay during the Fall Quarter 2017. This will be part of a series of essay posts from my classes at the end of my school quarters. This and all of my essays were written under my legal name, Dennis Camargo.

In the film La Mission, the audience is introduced to Che, a former prisoner and alcoholic, and his son Jes, a student just about to graduate high school. The plot of the film focuses on the tumultuous relationship between Che and Jes after Jes was inadvertently outed as a gay man by his father stumbling across photos of Jes in a gay club. In the film there is an underlying tone of Che interpreting male homosexuality as a force of consumerism and gentrification in La Mission, the area of San Francisco where the film takes place. Che is unable to reconcile his son’s queerness, therefore branding his son as a race trader and being complicit in the cultural genocide of a historically Mexican district of San Francisco.

Very early in the film, the audience is met with Che’s fears of La Mission falling victim to gentrification like many other parts of San Francisco. Che confronts his neighbor Lena, who has filed a complaint against Che with their landlord for blocking the sidewalk with his lowrider. The audience sees Che’s defensiveness against this complaint as encroachment of seemingly God-given right as a Mexican man to exert his dominance and symbols of masculinity in his Azatlan, the mythical homeland of Aztecs and by extension Mexican culture. He states “…after all you hipster types are tired of slummin’ it, I’m still going to be here,” to Lena, a black woman who personifies a typical hipster/gentrifier complete with fixed gear bicycle and an interest in New Age beliefs (00:10:15). Despite her race, her hipster interests are typified as white behavior and therefore is an extension of the cultural genocide of La Mission district. While her lifestyle is not necessarily queer, it is accepting of queerness which opens the door for more white culture to smother the hypermasculine, hyper heterosexual Chicano culture of La Mission.

Che has a very complex interpretation of his son’s queerness because of his history as a convict, his addiction to alcohol and the association of gay culture with alcohol, whiteness and consumerism. Che’s few associations with gayness are exemplified with the line “Is that why he’s manhandling you like you’re some Mexican bitch?,” (00:27:05) when he confronts Jes with the photographic evidence of is encounter with his white boyfriend. Another instance is an ad for here!, a gay-oriented on demand television channel being advertised on the busses he drives (00:40:26). These two instances can be interpreted as colonial, capitalist gentrifiers of his Azatlan, making Jes la Malinche, a historical figure vilified by Mexican people for selling out the Native Mexicans to the Spanish (Garsd). On a very tangential note, his association with queerness and clubbing, therefore alcohol use, can be seen as a white drug adulterating a perfect Aztec life, as there tremendous pride in Aztec identity among those who pride themselves as Chicano. This adulteration can be tied to the trope of Native Americans struggling with alcohol abuse.  

Conclusively, while Che’s interpretation of queerness and white hipsterdom gentrifying traditional black and brown neighborhoods is not necessarily incorrect, he fails to see the nuances of being queer. Queers of color can be equally weary of gentrification and cultural genocide of historically black and brown areas and are willing to protect la raza from falling victim to capitalism. Understanding of the intersectionality of being brown and queer will help in the effort against gentrification. 

Citations

La Mission, www.amazon.com/Mission-Benjamin-Bratt/dp/B003ZZ4H6K/ ref=sr_1_1? ie=UTF8&qid=1509596248&sr=8-1&keywords=la%2Bmission&dpID=513tWYMpb7L&preST=_SY300_QL70_&dpSrc=srch.

Garsd, Jasmine. “Despite Similarities, Pocahontas Gets Love, Malinche Gets Hate. Why?” NPR, NPR, 25 Nov. 2015, www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2015/11/25/457256340/despite-similarities-pocahontas-gets-love-malinche-gets-hate-why.

I'm convinced, that "Koisenu futari" is an extremely underrated show. The importance of its existence is simply enormous. Not only because of the aroace representation, but also because of how it helps allosexual people see what life and relationships can look like from a completely different perspective. How it teaches them to be more open and accepting of people who are different from them. And how it completely destroys all the patterns of modern film industry, considering that even in children's cartoons there is still, not very big, but usually at least some kind of romantic plotline for the main character. I'm so in love with this drama that I just can't

Great review!

Anatomy of a Fall (2023)

Of all the legal thrillers I’ve seen, Anatomy of a Fall feels the most genuine and relatable. While there are big revelations about the people involved and technically, they come suddenly, this isn’t a story of accidental confessions, surprise witnesses, or even earth-shattering pieces of evidence. Something happened while there were no witnesses present. The court must decide whether a crime was committed or not based on the evidence. That's it. In the process, the film peels back layers to reveal the truth and half-truths that comprise relationships.

Sandra Voyter (Sandra Hüller) is woken from a nap by her son, Daniel (Milo Machado-Graner). Her husband (his father), Samuel Maleski (Samuel Theis), has fallen from their roof and died. She insists it must have been an accident - he was working on the roof when she went to sleep. The authorities are not convinced and she is indicted on charges of murder.

There’s a particular line in the film that summarizes what a nightmare this situation is. It's something like “What you hear, it’s just a small part of the whole”. As we're presented with testimonies from experts and people who knew Samuel, as more evidence is brought forth, we're given a version of Sandra and Samuel's relationship. In a way, it’s not even Sandra who’s on trial; it’s her marriage. If she and her husband fought a lot, if someone was unfaithful, if someone was planning on leaving, then it probably means Sandra killed him. It’s not even if the whole relationship was bad; it’s if it was bad recently. We're not talking about "a rough patch" or something they could've overcome. This fragment is now the whole.

In a way, the trial is a matter of life and death. The jury is deliberating whether Sandra killed her husband. It’s also about an intimate subject you could call mundane in the grand scheme of things: two people’s marriage. Drawing a conclusion from the snippets presented is an unfair way to judge their relationship but it’s also the best way to see what it was like because you get the “highlight reel”. By the time this film is over, you feel like you know these people so well that they're no longer characters in a film. Then, you remember that quote from earlier and you second-guess everything. Do you really know? That sentiment is amplified by the revelations that come up during the trial. They’re not the sort of bombshells you’re used to seeing in these legal dramas, but they’re just as earth-shattering and revelatory.

The film is as absorbing as it is because of the excellent script by Justine Triet (who also directs) and Arthur Harari and the performances. There are so many character moments in Anatomy of a Fall that I see it as the kind of film you would come back to in the future, despite so much of the suspense coming from the uncertainty of the final verdict. Even some of the minor characters I keep thinking back to, like the two forensic analysts who bring to the stand completely different interpretations of three drops of blood found outside. It makes you wonder if they - despite having no investment in this narrative whatsoever - somehow made up their minds about the case anyway and brought in their biases. Why else would they be so combative? Many characters are deliberately unlikable, but not in a way that makes them villains. Wait. Did I dislike them because of who they really are, or because of the way I perceived them based on the evidence presented? hmm.

Anatomy of a Fall is a film of complex emotions. There are so many details in the case, the way the characters behave or relate to each other that you forget everything else around you. The performances are excellent, as is the script. You've never been put on trial for murder before but you'll know what it must feel like once the end credits roll. (March 27, 2024)

"You and I are perfect for each other. Never believe anything else."

Dark in Dusk In Winter Color Palette Meme Request for @demadogs

The Quiet Girl ‘An Cailín Ciúin’ (2022) dir. Colm Bairéad

be kind to that adult who never speaks at work, who’s strangely quiet at parties and dos.

be kind to the people who never smile, who seem stuck-up, emotionless or cold.

be kind to the person who only speaks when spoken to. who speaks in a very soft or quiet vocie. who speaks awkwardly and painfully.

tell them it’s okay if they can’t speak. tell them you care about them anyway. show them you see their talents.

support people with situational mutism. 🌹🌹

Say what you want about Saltburn but the color aesthetics are amazing. Some of the cinematography is almost ethereal. The movie is 50 shades of fucked up but the setting was beautiful!

Also.... Everyone is talking about the bathtub scene and the grave scene, but the menstruation vampire scene had me crossing my legs and scrunching my face into a knot.

honestly I love ash from fantastic mr fox so much because sometimes you have a parent who’s so impressive you’re never gonna live up to them and it’s all you want.

i’d rather be an athlete he is so me wanting to be as smart as my dad lol

and it’s not necessarily anything to do with them, you just want to be worthy of being their kid and others might not see you as?

which makes it so fucking emotional when ash and mr fox have that conversation- i’m so glad he was you