A Critical Exegesis of Tyler Perry’s ‘For Colored Girls’

I have seen pretty much every Tyler Perry movie and play, but I missed out on Madea’s Big Happy Family, and For Colored Girls. I had no one to go with, and when you go see a Tyler Perry movie you MUST have a date with a lady of some kind, or they will all think of you as a rotten homosexual, rapt by the comically muscled men with trapezius muscles that echo the angles of the great pyramids of Giza. But those men are objects, usually, so who cares? I do, because there is NOTHING WORSE than being gay. Luckily, I have a female visiting my house who likewise appreciates the Tyler Perry oeuvre of films and fine theatrical productions.

There is a ritual we have, where we fear each new Perry production will redeem his reputation. I say, “What if this one is better? What if it’s a good movie?” I always ask this because my human brain is now so dependent on irony to function, if Tyler Perry made a good movie it would be sort of like an aging alcoholic quitting the drink only to find his or her body unable to process the humors which the human machinery naturally produces (sincerity and goodwill). Luckily my fears are usually assuaged rather quickly. The closest Tyler (we are on a first name basis , despite never having met) has come to “inspiring” me (which I’m told is the #1 best emotion in film, inspiration!) is his film I Can Do Bad All By Myself, due to Taraji P. Henson’s skillful performance, but mostly due to the fact that the television I saw the film on had a brightness setting set very low, making the film appear darker and more “gritty” than his previous work. Of course in reality, that movie is just as over-lit as every other thing he’s done, but somehow turning on the dark (like Spiderman), made it easier to take his work seriously despite the bizarre slapstick violence (with no consequences) which characterize the Tyler Perry experience.

Guys, look! I'm making ART.

For Colored Girls, which was adapted by Tyler from Ntozake Shange’s Tony-nominated play, lacks Perry’s signature dialogue style (trains crashing into one another) and is replaced by drunken slam poetry. Yes, For Colored Girls is the Tyler Perry Art-haus film. The word “fuck” is even injected a couple of times. Tyler is really stepping out, getting that R-rating, he is so brave! The story follows 9 women who somehow all have a verbal IQ of 180, sort of like The Gilmore Girls, but with more poverty and also Janet Jackson (now a Perry regular). The last time we saw Janet was when she destroyed a room full of glass furniture in Why Did I Get Married, Too? Janet tries to channel a bit of that (admittedly hugely satisfying scene) into her For Colored Girls character, a high-powered fashion magazine editor, but is too busy hating poor people for no reason, and also finding out that her trapeziuslly endowed husband is an unsubtle homo. This is somewhat ironic considering she works for a fashion magazine and would constantly be swarmed by swathes of gay men. You would think Janet would have developed a better ‘dar than that, but it is true that those down-low gays are xtra sneaky. Janet doesn’t really have the range for the role, and it doesn’t help that the expressiveness of her face is limited by the gobs of botulism she and (pretty much all) her fellow cast members inject into their foreheads.

I'm still not sure.

Before delving into the most bizarre aspects of the film, something must be said about the all-around awesome Whoopi Goldberg, who performs admirably as a religious zealot with a taste for white robes and hoarding disorders. Whoopi really commits to the role, and it’s hard not to take her seriously. Loretta Devine, too, performs with a nuance and style that has rightfully made her famous. Unfortunately her role as a nurse is not particularly interesting. The best thing about Tyler Perry is that he consistently keeps under-utilized black actors working, but when the rest of the cast is competing with the emotionless carbonite-face of Janet Jackson, what can they do? Because this is 2011, and reality no longer matters, everyone must have a frozen face, which is odd because it makes one wonder how all these poverty stricken women afforded all that botox. Perhaps they went to rich-lady Janet’s house for an injectables party?

This is Janet's angry face.

It’s not easy being a colored girl ( so-called because each woman represents a color, like in The Power Rangers). When one goes to get a back-alley abortion, she is greeted by Macy Gray, who pretty much plays herself, a mumbling amateur whose rusty instruments produce inadequate and disappointing results. The abortion is unsatisfactory and about as heavy-handed as you imagine it to be. The other major dramatic turning point in the film is when Janet Jackson’s poor assistant confronts her alcoholic beau, who for seemingly no reason throws their two children out of a three-story window, killing the two adorable scamps. Was Janet Jackson comfortable with this scene? It’s awfully reminiscent of her brother’s legendary baby-hanging-over-the-balcony incident. How did an alcoholic get those children so neatly out the window? Not even MJ was so dextrous as to stick two children out of a window at once.

RUH ROH!

To return to the topic of dialogue, the movie is highly stylized, retaining the poetic style of the play. According to Wikipedia, the original play is pretty good. Tyler does no justice to the play’s style of soliloquizing, though—appearing as bizarrely overwritten Deviantart-style poetry translated into Japanese and back again by a homeless person who went to a Def Poetry Jam in 1998. The result is often totally incomprehensible, and worse, boring. Below is an example of dialogue from the script delivered by the totally forgettable dance instructor Yasmine.

She gets raped like 5 minutes later

YASMINE: I love dance more than I waz maduh-huh, uh-huh, more thanwhen I discovered Archie Shepp & subtle blues don’t cha know I wore out the magic of juju heroically resisting being possessed.Oooooooooooooh the sounds sneakin in under age to slug’s to stare at’a real ‘artiste’ ans every word outta imamu’s mouth waz gospel. And if Jesus couldn’t play a horn like Shepp wazn’t no need for colored folks to bear no cross at all and dance is my thank-you for music and I love you more than dance more than Aureliano Buendia loved macondo more than Hector Lavoe loved himself. More than the lady loved gardenias. More than Celia loves Cuba or Graciela loves el son more than the flamingoes love bein pretty. Te amo mas que  te amo mas que, we’re here. I had the best time.

In the hands of a more skillful director (like Michael Bay,) someone could maybe make sense of that, but whatever works on stage clearly lacks for context in Perry’s bizarre universe. Despite everyone’s genius level verbal IQ, everyone comes off as a blathering, self-obsessed sod. It’s another factor which contributes to the clumsiness of the entire ordeal. Another example: Tyler transitions from scene to scene by having the women tangentially interact with one another, transfering our focus from woman to woman to woman. It’s ambitious, and in the hands of a more subtle storyteller (Paul Verhoeven), it may have worked. The camera seems as if it’s operated by a bobbing voyeur, which works well enough, but is then spliced with hyper-stylized art shotz like the one below. Tyler surely got an A on this assignment when he turned it in for his Intro to Film class at University of Pheonix.

WATCH OUT FOR THAT GAY, JANET!

We’ve all seen Tyler Perry masturbate before (he usually performs under the name MADEA), but this is surely his most furiously masturbatory venture yet.

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