"FRUITVALE STATION"

Thursday, August 1, 2013

‘Fruitvale Station’ destroys stereotypes


By Kelvin Wade
From page A11 | August 01, 2013 | Leave Comment

Too often, young black men are seen as dangerous pit bulls in American society. And like a stray pit bull run over in the street, the lives of too many young African-American males are cut short through violent means.

This is the message delivered in a controversial scene in the controversial new movie, “Fruitvale Station.”

“Fruitvale Station” is first-time director Ryan Coogler’s film about the killing of 22-year-old Oscar Grant by transit police on the Fruitvale BART platform in Oakland in the wee hours of New Year’s Day 2009. Officer Johannes Mehserle, who claims he mistook his firearm for his Taser, fired one shot into Grant’s back. The film focuses on the final day of Grant’s life.

The power of the movie is in its ordinariness. It demolishes stereotypes and gives the viewer a realistic look into the life of a young African-American man struggling to get his life on track and be a better man for his girlfriend, better son to his mother and most importantly, a father who is there for his 4-year-old daughter.

One national reviewer claimed the movie sanitizes Grant. But Grant is depicted as an ex-con, drug dealing young man who has cheated on his girlfriend and is lying about his job. Not exactly a saint.

To show the humanity of Oscar Grant is the point of the film. In the past few weeks, both Vacaville and Fairfield police have killed suspects and when we hear about such shootings, the response among the public is to assume the suspect was a bad guy and it was justified.

It’s easy to caricature young black men in Oakland as thugs who are different from us and thus, we don’t have to care about them. But the film shows a complex three-dimensional person with relationship troubles, job and financial problems, but has a loving family. It shows a man trying to make up for being an absentee father by doting on his daughter.

During the fateful scene on the BART platform, Coogler shows us a widely chaotic milieu of suspects who don’t feel they’ve done anything wrong and can’t understand why they’re being detained, police who make things worse with their heavy-handed tactics some claim cross the line into brutality, and onlookers who are filming, shouting and chastising transit police. It would’ve been easy to make the police one-dimensional but the film shows us their distress after the shooting.

Michael B. Jordan turns a two-dimensional lionized victim into a flawed, struggling flesh-and-blood person. Octavia Spencer is pitch-perfect as Grant’s supportive yet exhausted mother.

“Fruitvale Station” raises questions not only about racial profiling in law enforcement, but how society perceives young black men. I think it also calls for a re-examination of how anyone, especially minorities, should respond to police. For me, it brought back a frightening encounter I had with an overzealous California Highway Patrol officer.

When I saw the film, the audience was mostly black. Out of about 30 people, four were white (including the friend I saw it with). It didn’t surprise me because obviously, African-Americans relate more to this story. But people of all backgrounds should see this haunting stereotype-obliterating film.

“Fruitvale Station” (rated R with a running time of 85 minutes) is playing at the Edwards Stadium 16 in Fairfield. Peace.