Why "Nina" Could Be One of the Biggest Critical and Commercial Failures of All Time

 

Not everyone can be as dope as Denzel Washington was in Spike Lee's Malcolm X (1992); in fact, many people to this day still feel like Washington was cheated out of an Academy Award for his stirringly convincing portrayal.  (Surprise, surprise.)  Angela Bassett rose to new heights with her Oscar-nominated performance as Tina Turner in What's Love Got to Do with It (1993)--not to mention that Laurence Fishburne was so Ike Turner that you had to remind yourself not to hate him in anything else!  Delivering an Oscar-winning performance in Ray (2004), Chris Rock recently drove home this point: "Jamie Foxx was so good in Ray that they went to the hospital and unplugged the real Ray Charles.  It's like, 'We don't need two of these!'"  In these instances, it is evident that casting the right people to play real-life legends can be done.  However, not all biopics are created equal.  Bringing the late, great Notorious B.I.G. to the big screen was met with mixed results in Notorious (2009)  as it seemed to place film co-producer Sean "Puffy" Combs in more of a favorable light while pissing off Lil' Kim and many of her faithful fans for how she was portrayed.  Also see one of the biggest casting failures of all time as Flex Alexander was selected to play Michael Jackson in Man in the Mirror: The Michael Jackson Story (2005)--a film produced for VH1 that did not even feature any of Jackson's songs, but merely mentioned them in passing.

Scribbler's 11th Hour Post of the Week: Why Chris Rock Was the Right Host for the Oscars

I don't know how this debate ever got started among Black people, but it's one of the many moments where we just have to compare two people who are often nothing like each other stylistically speaking.  For years, the question was who's the funnier comedian between Chris Tucker and Chris Rock?  Maybe it's because they're both Black and named Chris, but whatever.  Most people I know said Chris Tucker was funnier, and I understood it because between Friday, Money Talks and Rush Hour, he frankly made better and funnier movies.  On cue, a lot of those same people said that Chris Rock wasn't funny at all...because no two Black folk being compared to each other can both be good.  (See the Jay-Z vs. Nas, Beyonce vs. Rihanna or old school hip-hop vs. new school hip-hop debates as the evidence behind my shade.)  However, although Tucker was funny as a stand-up comedian, I've always preferred Chris Rock in that capacity because I felt like he injected more social commentary without sacrificing the funny.  I thought the whole "you put the money in a book" bit from Bring the Pain (1996) was one of the funniest things that I've ever heard because, like most poignant comedy, there's a lot of truth behind that joke that says so much more about the issues in our community than the punch line can convey.  So amidst the most scared section of White America not having the best five-year period regarding race relations let alone the best Black History Month, it was only fitting that Chris Rock hosted the 88th Academy Awards.

"I'm Not a Racist, But..."

Okay...so maybe you're not as racist as this guy.  Maybe your family never owned slaves.  Perhaps you don't walk up to the first person Black person you see and call him or her a "nigger".  There's a possibility that you don't believe in burning crosses on lawns or hanging "strange fruit" from trees and then having a ham sandwich and a cold glass of lemonade with the family to celebrate it.  However, you might be bold enough to say this...