M artin L uther K ing J r .
January 11, 2017
Page 35
2017 special edition
Arts &
ENTERTAINMENT
A Hunger for Films about ‘Hidden Figures’
o Pinionated
J udge
by J udge
d arleen
o rTega
I am often struck by the narrow
range of stories that see the light
of day in American films and pop-
ular media. The films we have
had up to now about the Ameri-
can space program, for example,
depict rooms full of white men
and, in general, what few films
we have depicting black women
rarely center on their experience
and certainly don’t involve their
contributions to American history
or scientific exploration. Contrary
to the excuse offered by Kevin
Costner in a recent MSNBC inter-
view, the stories we are missing on
screen are not necessarily found in
history books, nor can their ab-
sence from popular media be ex-
plained by the view that, really,
“how many stories can you tell?”
The black women whose
mathematical skills powered the
American space program in the
1960s would still be unknown to
most of us were it not for a recent
book by Margot Lee Shetterly,
which became the basis for the
new film “Hidden Figures.” The
film focuses on three of the many
women whose lives are explored
in Shetterly’s book, and provides
a long-neglected window into
their particular stories and the
larger context for the women who
worked as “computers” in the
space program in the mid-20th
century.
It is about time we learned these
stories, and I do mean to urge ev-
eryone to see this film, which
gives a flavor of the contributions
of such women and the barriers
they faced to build their careers. I
hope, however, that we will avoid
what appears to be a widespread
temptation to minimize those
barriers and to over-applaud Hol-
lywood for giving us one film in
which accomplished and intelli-
gent women of color are the cen-
tral focus. This is at best a start,
and by no means a perfect one;
our hunger for such stories should
not divert us from pushing for a
broader range of narratives and for
those stories to be told with less
pandering to the dominant culture.
The three real-life women at
the center of the film, engagingly
played by Taraji P. Henson, Octa-
PhoTo courTeSy h oPPer S Tone /20 Th c enTury f ox
A scene from the film ‘Hidden Figures’ depicts black employees at NASA during the 1960s when the
workforce was segregated by race.
via Spencer, and Janelle Monáe,
are among a large number of black
women who were employed as hu-
man “computers” before machines
could do that work. Women with
the right skills were thought to be
more likely to approach the task of
mathematical calculation with the
necessary dogged attention to de-
tail -- but in the segregated South,
black women did the work in a
separate section of NASA, with
separate bathrooms and cafeterias.
The film devotes some atten-
tion to the realities of life under
segregation. Henson’s character,
Katherine Johnson, has to run half
a mile in heels in all weather just
to get to the nearest “colored” la-
dies room to relieve herself; her
male colleagues undermine her
and take credit for her work, and
install a separate “colored” coffee
pot for her, the only person of col-
or in her unit. Spencer’s charac-
ter, Dorothy Vaughn, supervises
a department for years without
the benefit of the title or pay that
goes along with it, and she and
her sons are kicked out of the lo-
cal public library for not confining
themselves to the poorly-stocked
colored section. Monáe’s charac-
ter, Mary Jackson, has to petition
the city to allow her to take the
courses she needs to pursue an en-
gineering degree because they are
only taught in an all-white school.
The level of specificity depicted
here is more than we usually see.
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Yet in many ways the struggles
are smoothed over, suggesting the
filmmakers’ likely unconscious de-
sire to spare viewers too much dis-
comfort. The women live in nice
homes and have wardrobes, hair,
and make-up that is too art-direct-
ed to be realistic (a common Hol-
lywood problem), suggesting that
their lives, though separate from
white folks, are basically otherwise
equal. They vigorously call out
racism with a clarity that was much
more dangerous and unlikely in
1962, with consequences no worse
than being ignored. And the im-
pact of their words on white peo-
ple is overplayed, as when Johnson
blows up at her office colleagues
about her long treks to the ladies
room, and is met with stunned and
chastened silence from her entire
department. Her white male su-
pervisor then marches down to the
colored restroom and knocks down
its signage.
I’m confident that scenes like
that just didn’t happen. Johnson’s
white supervisor never tore down
any Jim Crow signs. Her most ob-
structionist male colleague did not
suddenly experience a change of
heart and begin bringing her cof-
fee. Vaughn’s nemesis likewise
did not suddenly begin treating her
with respect. Somehow Johnson,
Vaughn, and Jackson and women
like them survived despite the im-
pediments of racism and white su-
premacy, but it cannot have been
primarily because of changes of
heart in their white counterparts.
That is not how racism and white
supremacy manifest, and as much
as I appreciated the pieces of their
story that were told in “Hidden
Figures,” I left longing for a more
insightful and honest rendition of
how oppressed people manage to
endure slights that don’t have an
end date, how they manage to pull
out their best work over and over
again when no one supports them
and no one applauds or even sees
it. I’m still looking for the film
that more honestly grapples with
how it is that such figures remain
hidden. This film brings important
bits to light, but still leaves them
partially obscured.
Darleen Ortega is a judge on
the Oregon Court of Appeals and
the first woman of color to serve
in that capacity. Her movie review
column Opinionated Judge ap-
pears regularly in The Portland
Observer. Find her movie blog at
opinionatedjudge.blogspot.com.
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