Review of Dear White People (2014) by Plumcrazypurple — 21 Oct 2014

The beginning of the movie was excellent because it very quickly and efficiently gave a large amount of backstory without coddling the viewer. I felt that the early scenes of the movie was where the movie was the strongest.

As a viewer It was easy for me to understand the plights of each of the four main characters on which the movie was focused on. All of the actors performances were full of emotion and feeling, everyone carried their own.

As someone who doesn't pay as much attention as he probably should to issues of discrimination and prejudice, this film portrayed, and introduced a variety of issues in a way that I was able to quickly grasp and understand.

Instead of blatantly stating what part of Black culture that a character was supposed to represent, the film used context and imagery to achieve the same message. The bread and butter of the film was showing the interactions and experiences that people of certain groups and orientations go through and what they feel during these events.

The film was also very friendly in its presentation and did not at all during any moment, come off as preachy or oppressive. However, I thought that it was perhaps a little too friendly. Instead of taking the opportunity to enlighten the viewer on some issues the movie read more like a safe and formulaic story.

The plot line was also a bit hard to follow because the story felt so much like simple life events. Thats not to say that it was bad, its just not the usual overstimulating action flick that I would usually go see.

In conclusion, the movie was great, the actors were on point, the cinematography was quirky, and the story was educational for me but I somehow expected to see a more provocative film. It was a movie that I strongly recommend you go see in theaters but I don't recommend that you buy on DVD.