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There are similarities between The Blind Side and Precious, the hit indie film about a pregnant, illiterate teenage girl whose teacher goads her toward self-worth. Both Michael and Precious begin as scholastic failures with awful moms and no hope who are reclaimed and saved by a caring adult woman. Except that, here, we see the awkward teen through the eyes of his white benefactor. Leigh Anne's first visit to Michael's old neighborhood is treated like Margaret Mead landing on Samoa. She delivers tough love to Michael's mother and tough lip to the local drug lords...
...Gentleman's Agreement, an Oscar winner about a reporter who pretends to be Jewish while reporting a story on anti-Semitism, one of the film's crew was asked what the moral was. "Be nice to Jews," he said, "because they might turn out to be Gentiles." The Blind Side says to be nice to homeless black kids because they could become NFL stars. Whether they want to or not. Michael certainly gets a warm bed, lots of food and familial affection from the Tuohys; they gave him a purpose-driven life. But it's their purpose. They drove...
Indeed, because of the animated Disney film, the character Mulan has become one of the most recognizable symbols of Chinese culture worldwide. Baby girls adopted from China have been named Mulan by their American parents. Disney has staged musical versions of the movie Mulan from Mexico to the Philippines. And posing for a photo with Mulan is a must for hordes of tourists at Hong Kong Disneyland. (See China's long road to prosperity...
...film's Hong Kong director, Jingle Ma, says the new 115-minute Mulan is a sweeping melodrama that depicts the central character as an action hero, dutiful daughter and wistful romantic. The film stars Vicki Zhao Wei, who shot to fame in the late 1990s playing the wide-eyed lead role in the television series Princess Pearl. Zhao may have gotten the role because of her tomboy image in action films such as Red Cliff and So Close, but in Mulan, she appears with full makeup and long, glossy fingernails - even as a soldier...
While the Disney film wove comedy into a Disney-esque plot about a young girl breaking out of the confines of tradition to pursue her own destiny, the new Mulan focuses on patriotism, filial piety, romance and the difficulties of war. The formula is part of an evolving mainland genre that has seen filmmakers incorporating more nuanced, entertaining storytelling into patriotic plots. "China is anxious to be part of the global community. There's a lot of concern over soft power right now," says Poshek Fu, professor of cinema studies at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. "Movies...