Mamma’s Race and Gender
I graduated college two months ago. Since my exit from forced women power and crazy scheduling, I’ve realized how much an asset my private women’s education is – and what I now miss from my ignorance.
I went to see Mamma Mia last night. I am a musical fanatic. I’ve seen all the movie musicals – old and new – and I’m happy to see that they are on the rise again.
While Mamma Mia is very entertaining, and I’m ecstatic to see older women having as much fun as younger ones, it has its problems. The story is about a white woman and her daughter, and their respective white friends. It could have been easy to put a woman of color among the four friends – they’re supposed to be in Greece anyway – but every woman was a variation of the American ideal. There was unnecessary race differentiation between the main (white) characters and the (Greek/one black man) chorus. The only black man in the movie was sexualized and said only a few lines throughout the movie. It reminded me a bit of how scantily-clad women are sexualized in music videos.
Second, even as this movie was about women (having fun), the director ignored that idea, and went straight to sexism. It began with the black man taking the bags for the white woman. The woman couldn’t get the bag herself – she was living up to her “helpless” role. It makes you wonder how the bag got in the car in the first place. Throughout the movie, women crawl to their men (literally), sit in the presence of their man, be blocked by men, be saved by men, and have men take over their tasks. Not once, did a woman did any of those actions (as far as I could tell) in the movie. Women had no power in the action, only in the song, it seemed.
Yet, after my criticism, I still encourage you to go see the movie. It is funny, cute, appeals to both old and young, campy, and – most importantly – a wonderful musical!