The 2009 film directed by Lee Daniels, Precious: Based on the Novel Push by Sapphire, tells a story about the life of a 16-year-old, Claireece “Precious” Jones, who grew up in Harlem during the late 1980s. Precious lives a life that includes many sociological issues that have unarguably caused her great pain throughout her young life. Having endured poverty, sexual abuse, and verbal abuse her life has been far from perfect, but she realizes the need to defeat these negative sociological factors to achieve a life that seems to her as only a fantasy. Daniels effectively portrays the source of Precious’s problems, as well as the way in which she deals with them; thus, achieving his goal in allowing the audience to see the effects of negative social culture, specifically oppression, on victims.
Daniels does not waste time in demonstrating the personality of Precious since in the opening scene she is shown causing a fight with another classmate. Discussing the fight and Precious’ second pregnancy, the principal recommends she transfer to an alternative school. Precious admitted to the film’s audience that she always sits in the back of her classes and does not speak much, and the audience is able to infer soon after that she is illiterate (Fletcher, 2008). However, this soon changes after enrolling into the alternative school taught by Ms. Blu Rain. Ms. Rain encourages Precious to be positive, reminding her that “everybody is good at something,” (Fletcher, 2008) and she also helps Precious develop her literacy skills.
Having given birth to her second child, Abdul, Precious returns home from the hospital in hopes of caring for her new-born, but as the audience sees it is a mistake. Precious lives with her mother, Mary, in the housin...
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...he director effectively demonstrates this in the film, but he also shows how Precious managed to escape this type of lifestyle. With encouragement and the realization that there is a way out, Precious is determined to start a new life in the best interest of herself and her children. As Ken S. Keyes’ quote was displayed during the opening of the film, “Everything is a gift from the universe,” Ms. Rain can be considered a gift to Precious for allowing her to see this new life. Ultimately, that is the director’s message: oppression is real and the effects are monumental. More importantly individuals need to realize that injustice does not just happen in foreign countries (countries in Asia and Africa), but oppression also happens here in the U.S. And it can very well be happening to someone you know—be a gift to others in helping them out of their abuse.
The crisis event in the movie precious is rather obscure at first. At first look you think that the crisis event is that precious is kicked out of school sent to an alternative school because she's pregnant, however I disagree. I believe the true crisis event occurred after precious had her child and went home to her mother’s apartment. Up to that point, precious had never asked for help from anyone regarding her home life or the abuse that was taking place. When precious’s returned home from the hospital with her baby and was attacked by her mother, she ran away to the only place she knew to go that was safe, her school.
This film represents our indigenous culture and regardless of what happens we can find good in a situation. Together the black and white community can come together and achieve more than they could ever do by themselves.
Marie had just traveled from her hometown of Ville Rose, where discarding your child made you wicked, to the city of Port-Au-Prince, where children are commonly left on the street. Marie finds a child that she thinks could not be more beautiful, “I thought she was a gift from Heaven when I saw her on the dusty curb, wrapped in a small pink blanket, a few inches away from a sewer as open as a hungry child’s yawn” (79). Marie has suffered many miscarriages, so she takes this child as if it were her own, “I swayed her in my arms like she was and had always been mine” (82). Marie’s hope for a child has paid off, or so it seems. Later, it is revealed that the child is, in fact, dead, and Marie fabricated a story to sanction her hopes and distract her from the harsh reality of her life, “I knew I had to act with her because she was attracting flies and I was keeping her spirit from moving on…
Whenever Sira, Aminata’s mother went to help women deliver their babies, Aminata would go along too. She would watch and help her mother, eventually le...
...they deserved something positive in return. These people in Rosewood suffered because of the color of their skin and not anything else. I have realized that I am lucky to have the choices I have in my education, and athletics, and I am grateful to be able to play basketball for my school—as back in the times that they lived, they were simply lucky to be alive and did not have any choice in sports to play or fun to have. They simply worked for white people, and tried to stay away from death. They were not given the chances that I have today. This movie gave me a new, grateful and thankful view on the society I live in today.
This book shows the struggles that the main character, Precious Jones, has to go through after she was raped by her father twice. Not only is she raped, but her mother does nothing about it and just wants her to live with what ha...
Once a slave, Nanny tells of being raped by her master, an act from which Janie’s mother was brought into the world. With a
Instead of providing a safe and loving environment for her daughter, she built up anger towards her and eventually lashed out, physically and emotionally abusing her. Mary carries resentment towards Precious because Carl preferred having sex with Precious rather than Mary. The resentment continued and progressively became more aggressive as the movie went on. Child abuse is a major social issue in not only the United States but all over the world. Cases of child abuse and neglect that involve black children are reported and are approximately twice that of the cases that involve white children. This film sheds light on negative social issues that occur in young African- American children lives, and how these characters within this movie gained power and ultimately decide to peruse a positive life for themselves. Out of the 7.4 billion people in this world, forty million children are abused each year; that is only the amount of reported cases and does not include unreported cases. In the United States, a child is abused every ten seconds. Abuse typically leads to an unsuccessful life, despite your race or ethnicity. Statically speaking, child abuse victims have a 38% increase arrest rate for violent crimes; and 84% of all prison inmates had been abused as a child. As her mother beats her; Precious dreams of a better life and eventually takes the necessary steps to achieve that dreamed about life. The director
The seriousness is enough to make you lose faith in humanity for a second, but catch your attention and evoke deep and reflection thought into the truth that goes on in the part of society that is unknowingly ignored by the population because it gets constantly overshadowed by media and the government. More importantly, the film reminds us that progress will move forward only when those at the top of authority realize they need to relate with and answer to the people who want change, answer to the voices of people those broken, traumatized, who truly need
This movie is a wonderful production starting from 1960 and ending in 1969 covering all the different things that occurred during this unbelievable decade. The movie takes place in many different areas starring two main families; a very suburban, white family who were excepting of blacks, and a very positive black family trying to push black rights in Mississippi. The movie portrayed many historical events while also including the families and how the two were intertwined. These families were very different, yet so much alike, they both portrayed what to me the whole ‘message’ of the movie was. Although everyone was so different they all faced such drastic decisions and issues that affected everyone in so many different ways. It wasn’t like one person’s pain was easier to handle than another is that’s like saying Vietnam was harder on those men than on the men that stood for black rights or vice versa, everyone faced these equally hard issues. So it seemed everyone was very emotionally involved. In fact our whole country was very involved in president elections and campaigns against the war, it seemed everyone really cared.
.... Precious was finally proud of herself for doing well in school. In addition, her friends, her teacher, and her social worker were recognizing her efforts–these were some of her external esteem needs. Finally, at the very end of the movie, it is arguable that that she was self-actualized, even though this stage is never able to be satisfied because as one grows psychologically there are always new opportunities to continue to grow. However, for the time being, she was happy and free from her mother.
...ness, an intangible and insidious sense that society is ruled by white privilege is a double burden upon the black poor in America. Precious is a film that looks behind this lovely idea to examine the economic forces and psychological detriments that make it an easier said than done experience, for individuals like Precious and people who are attached to her. Precious is, in every sense, a film that pushes this country to eschew self-congratulation and forces us to really take inventory of how we live and function as a society. The final moments in which Precious escapes from her wrecked home to begin her life on her own, is fact the best part of the entire film; the hope that is rebirth and new possibilities sprung forth like a Phoenix from her ashes. Those Marco systems that failed her as a child now will be her primary sources of support her as an adult.
... It states that there is different inequality socially and politically. Inequality is determined by people’s ideals of what they were taught and society projects as the superior and inferior races. This film shows that there is a way to change that if you make the other side see how they affect the people they are discriminating against.
Non judgmental and Compassion was a message in this movie. If more people would have compassion for others we would live in a better world. It is important to be non judgmental because people never know what happens in a person's life to cause them to act out in a certain way. Mrs. Erin Gruwell’s students were separated along racial lines and had few aspirations beyond street survival. Many people warned her that her students were all criminals who couldn’t be taught. With all odds stacked against her, she accepted the teaching position at Wilson High School. Erin Gruwell saw more in the students than a future as criminals and gang members; she saw them as people who have lost their ways in life. Instead of turning her back as society had done, she held out a helping hand. She had compassion and was non judgmental toward the children’s actions and hatred for one another. Being judgmental...
The main subject that is in the film is racism. The one of the two concepts I learned was within a busy city people’s lives collide with one another. Another concept is that everyone has different amounts of racism in them ranging from prejudice to full out racism. I felt much emotion while watching the movie as struggle added up for all the characters. I mostly