Bamboozled - the Movie

Bamboozled

Bamboozled, a controversial movie produced by Spike Lee, is based on the relationships that forms between people of racially contrasting perspectives. Throughout Bamboozled the audience sees the struggle between Dunwitty, the white boss, and Pierre Delacroix, the black scriptwriter. Dunwitty exemplifies white power and although he believes it to be alright to casually throw the word “nigger” around in a conversation, he doesn’t truly appreciate or respect the black race. Lott and Bell Hooks are two writers that point out the nature of the “Other’s” race. Lott, a writer who specializes in cultural studies, speaks about how blackness has formed from the way whites have treated them. In Racial Cross-Dressing and the Construction of American Whiteness, Lott expresses his views on how whites tend to act black, and blacks tend to act white. Bell Hooks, a feminist writer, speaks out from a different stand point. In her writing, Representing Whiteness in the Black Imagination, she talks mainly about how blacks view whites. Bell Hooks feels that in general, blacks tend to feel terror towards whites and their superior place in society. She also states that it is important to accept each others race in order to appreciate each other. After watching Bamboozled, analyzing both the Hooks and Lott readings, it is apparent that without compassion and empathy, it is impossible to truly understand and appreciate the black race and black culture.

Bamboozled, acclaimed for being the “most outrageous and disturbing movie Spike Lee has made to date,” is a satire that deals strongly with societies’ and television’s views on African-Americans. Pierre Delacroix, a Harvard graduate is a program executive at a cable TV network that has fallen behind in ratings. In one of the very first scenes Delacroix enters a business meeting late. The first remark made was that Delacroix was “pulling a Rodman”. From this comment, it becomes evident that Delacroix does not receive respect from his boss or his fellow co-workers. What’s interesting is that the audience also learns in this beginning scene that Delacroix uses a fake accent to make himself appear to be whiter.

Dunwitty, Delacroix’s superior, is, in his own eyes, admirably unprejudiced. It is easy to see the relationship between Delacroix and Dunwitty is strained. Dunwitty, when speaking, uses terms and slang that a typical black person may use. His office is draped in pictures of famous black athletes and African art. His actions scream blackness, where as Delacroix acts in a manner that is more reserved and typically would be considered more white.

In one particular scene, Dunwitty, known for his profanity and racial slurs tells Delacroix that the ideas he has come up with thus far for a fresh and innovative black show are "too white". While speaking to Delacroix, Dunwitty even goes as far as to use the word “nigger” several times, as if it holds no meaning or significance. After Delacroix becomes offended from his boss’s inappropriateness and blatant disrespect, Dunwitty informs him that he has “a black wife and two biracial kids,” which makes it acceptable for him to use the word “nigger” frequently in conversations. Dunwitty goes on to tell Delacroix that, in fact, he is “blacker than him." Although Delacroix doesn’t act extremely black he is black enough to resent the way Dunwitty and the network treat him.

“Our typical focus on the way ‘blackness’ in the popular imagination has been produced out of white cultural expropriation and travesty misses how necessary this process is to the making of white American manhood. The latter simply could not exist without a racial other against which it defines itself and which to a very great extent it takes up into itself as one of its own constituent elements.” This quote, taken from Eric Lott’s Racial Cross-Dressing and the Construction of American Whiteness, talks mainly about “blackness” views on “whiteness” and how blacks have formed from whites and how white society was formed from forming the blacks. When Lott states that “the latter simply could not