CULTURE |
FILM
BASEINSTINCT
Here’s a feelgoodBrit flick with a familiar
formula andmomentsthat mighthave
beenliftedfrom adozen films you’ve
already seen –includingdirectorPeter
Cattaneo’s ownTheFullMonty.Military
Wivestells the true story of a groupof
womenon a military base who formeda
choir when their other halves were away
inAfghanistanandendedup at number
one at Christmasin 2011.KristinScott
ThomasandCatastrophe’s SharonHorgan
are terrificas warringWAGs.MilitaryWivesisincinemasfromMarch 6TheuncompromisingNobel
Prize-winning novelist Toni
Morrison gets the tribute
she so richly deserves,
says Cath ClarkeREVIEWI
n the 1960s, before she was a Nobel
Prize-winning novelist, Toni Morrison
was a single mother raising two small
boys with a demanding job as a book
editor in New York. She’d set her alarm for 4 am
every day, waking up before sunrise to work on
the novelthat becameTheBluestEye.She kept
a notepadin the car to jot aline or twodown
at trafficjams. Oneday she wrotea to-dolist
that filledan entiresheet of paperthen crossed
out everythingthat wasn’t essentialto herlife,
leavingtwo tasks:“motheringandnovels”.
Interviewedfor this smart,insightful
documentarybeforeherdeathlast summer
aged88,Morrisonis extraordinary inThe
PiecesI Am–she practically glows with the
wisdom andunfakeable warmthof a woman
with nothingleft to prove,who has sussedout
what’s importantinlife. Growingup in Ohio,
her neighbourhoodwas mixed,but Morrison’s
dad,who’dwitnessedtwo men beinglynched
as a boy, neverlet a white personin the house.
WithTheBluestEyeshe wrotethe book that she
wantedto read–no one was writingaboutblack girls. They were “jokesor props”
inliterature.The title came from a
childhoodmemoryof internalised
racismandself-loathing–a friend
who toldher“I’ve been praying
for two years for blue eyes.” There
is a gorgeousmusicalquality to
Morrison’s voice as she tells allthis.
Archivevideo footageof her reading
extractsfrom her novels made the
hairs on the back of my neck prickle.
Early reviewswere positivebut
often clueless. One concluded:“She’s
too talentedto just write aboutblack
people.” Thelack of expositionfor
white people in her novels rattled
the critics.Morrisonspeaksof“the
white gaze” andthe assumptionby
reviewersthat her reader was white.
In archiveTV footagean interviewer
asks her if she gets sick andtired
of being calleda“black woman
writer”.She smiles. “Ilike it.I am
allthose things.”
In telling the story of herlife and
novels, this fascinatingdocumentary
sketchesout a historyofAfrican-
Americansfrom slavery onwards too,
illustratedwith stunningpicturesby
African-Americanartists.Morrison
wrote11 novels includingSula,Song
ofSolomonandthe Pulitzer-winning
Beloved,inspiredby the true story of
MargaretGarner,a runawayslave
who slit her two-year-olddaughter’s
throatratherthan watchher be
returnedto a slave owner.Director
TimothyGreenfield-Sanders gets
insightfulinterviewsfrom academics
andwriters,thoughperhapslets
the runningtimedrift alittle (the
film is a bitlong at two hours).One
commentatorpointsout that until
Morrisoncame along the slave storywas the story of men. Walter Mosley
speaksbeautifully. “You don’t want
to be a character in a Toni Morrison
novel.She is writing scorched earth,”
he says. “Her characters take on all
the sufferingwhich has created us,
whichhas made us so beautiful.”
In her early years as a novelist
Morrisoncontinued to work
in publishing,bringing other
African-American writers to the
table. She persuaded Black Panther
activistAngela Davis to write an
autobiographyand edited a book
by MuhammadAli.
She wasn’t interested in
navigatingthe world of white men. “I
was more interesting than them,” she
sayslaughing.Once, after hearing
that the men at work got a bigger
bonus,she marched into her boss’s
office saying:“I’m the head of the
household,justlike you.” She got her
raise. What a woman.ToniMorrison:The Pieces I Am
isincinemasfrom March 6
@CathxClarkeShe wasn’t
interested in
navigating
the world of
white men
Saying
it loud
Race for the truth
Toni Morrison spent her life telling
it like it was for black peoplePhoto Credit: Timothy Greenfield-Sanders / Courtesy of Magnolia Pictures32 | BIGISSUE.COM 02 -08 MARCH 2020