WHEN FILMS GO FOR BROKE
Where do we learn poverty is shameful and dangerous? At the movie theatre
The well-to-do wife of Steven Mnuchin, U.S. treasury secretary, former actress Louise Linton, recently shared a heated exchange on Instagram over photographs of her wearing (and flaunting) expensive clothing brands. Linton, who once gave an interview about the dozens of diamonds and other jewels she would be wearing to wed Mnuchin, asked the commenter if she had “given more to the economy than me and my husband? Either as an individual earner in taxes OR in self-sacrifice to your country?” and concluded with a final barb: “Your life looks cute.”
Not a big surprise: After all, Linton and Mnuchin are both creatures of Hollywood, a territory none too friendly to poor people.
In the entirety of U.S. cinema, there are fewer than 300 movies that significantly concern themselves with poverty or homelessness. Often, movies that seem to be about poor people are actually about rich people. If you know My Man Godfrey, Oliver Twist or My Own Private Idaho, you may remember them as being about, respectively, a Depression-era hobo, a hungry orphan boy or two homeless hustlers. But in each instance, the central character is actually a rich man in poor drag.
The Soloist appears to be about a homeless Juilliard-trained musician played by Jamie Foxx. But the narrative actually centres on the reporter (Robert Downey Jr.) and how he finds new meaning in his work, saves his marriage and repairs his relationship with his son — all thanks to the Important Lessons he learns by helping Foxx. It’s one way in which old doctrines show themselves, counselling us to aid The Poor because it’s a way to achieve our own salvation.
Poor people on film are often irredeemable and irresponsible. Precious purports to care about its characters but nonetheless traffics in the ugliest racist stereotypes about welfare recipients and poor African-Americans.
The Grapes of Wrath, still among the best movies about poverty, shows audiences rural families in need. So does The Glass Castle, along with better films like Winter’s Bone, Frozen River and Wendy and Lucy.