The Failure of Monster's Ball

Monster's Ball, directed by Marc Forster, attempted to analyze the ethical dilemma of the modern-day "slave" in the United States. In other words, Forster wanted to present the lasting effects of slavery on the social condition of present day African Americans. However, the film limited itself of such analysis by shifting from discussing ethical dilemmas to moral dilemmas in order to make this film Oscar worthy.

Monster's Ball touches upon to the "non-existence" of the African-American in everyday society. For example, there are several bird-eye view shots when Leticia and Tyrell see Lawrence for the last time before his execution (an African-American family). This represents how the African-American is trapped and cannot climb the paradigm to a better position. Also, Lawrence can never escape enclosure because he is constantly surrounded by prison walls, prison bars, prison guards, or is filmed on security cameras. From just these few examples, it is obvious that this film could have had great potential of surfacing these modern day issues but decided to shift to the less confrontational moral dilemmas.

Once Lawrence and Tyrell have died, Letitica finds herself needing the company of Hank- a white, racist, ex-prison guard. She needs him for a number of reasons: money, emotional support, and sex. Forster tries to disguise all of these reasons with love. In the middle of the movie, Hank's father (also racist) offends Leticia and she decides to avoid Hank for a time being. She eventually needs him again once she is evicted from her home and he invites her to live with him. Toward the end of the movie, Hank tells Leticia that he is going to take care of her. She says "Good. Cuz' I need to be taken care of." This proves that the film does not antagonize African-American's relation to the world- it supports it. It furthers the notion that the white "human" will always be superior to the black "non-human". Once Leticia finds out that Hank was actually one of the prison guards who executed her husband, she is initially upset but eventually submits to him and does not say anything. In the final scene (picture above), Hank feeds Leticia ice cream- representing his ownership of her. This film gives audiences the impression that blacks need whites in order to "make it".

Frank B. Wilderson III was a past teacher of mine who taught African American Drama in Film. This film was one of his primary examples of the social condition of African-Americans but agrees that it failed to bring up anything revolutionary to audiences. In his book Red, White & Black, Wilderson describes the scene when Leticia beings sobbing uncontrollably about her dead son Tyrell and his low position in society:

"I didn't want him to be fat like that...'cause I know a Black man in America- you can't be like that" (2). She then bursts into uncontrollable sobbing while Hank says in a dumbfounded manner "I'm not sure what you want me to do" (3). Wilderson explains why this potentially ethical dilemma immediately turns into a moral dilemma: "...Hank's...'I'm not sure what you want me to do' has the effect of a punctuation mark on...Leticia's stream of consciousness, it snaps them both back into their roles" (3).

The truth that IS surfaced in this film is that bi-racial Leticia and white Hank can only be together as long as they avoid analyzing their structures in society.