The Color Purple [PG]

This is the story of Celie, an uneducated black woman living a life of poverty in rural South America. For long years, Celie’s life was a sad story: her children had been taken away from her, she was forced to marry a brutal man whom she called “Mr.” and worst of all, her husband took away the one person who truly loved her: her sister Nettie. Living a jailed life of subservience, fragility, and abuse and sharing her grief with only God, Celie is transformed by the friendship of two special women, and she finds the strength to fight, she finds self-worth, and most of all, she finds love and the power to forgive. 

I have no bodily fluids left in me; they’ve all come out through my eyes and nose. This has to be the most sentimental, dramatic, powerful, and heart breaking and emotionally shattering movie that I have ever seen! Based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Alice Walker and directed beautifully by none other than Steven Spielberg, The Color Purple is an absolutely beautiful movie that attacks every emotional avenue of the body: it makes the eyes water, it makes the tears flow and the nose run, it chokes the throat and makes you sob violently, and it just breaks the heart cleanly in two. It’s a most glorious and beautifully sad movie. 

This is the story of Celie, an uneducated black woman living a life of poverty in rural South America. For long years, Celie’s life was a sad story: her children had been taken away from her, she was forced to marry a brutal man whom she called “Mr.” and worst of all, her husband took away the one person who truly loved her: her sister Nettie. Living a jailed life of subservience, fragility, and abuse and sharing her grief with only God, Celie is transformed by the friendship of two special women, and she finds the strength to fight, she finds self-worth, and most of all, she finds love and the power to forgive. 

When one thinks of Spielberg, one envisages nostalgic child stories, light drama, friendship, and science fiction. One would not pick such a dramatic and emotional story as this to be his choice for dramatic affirmation. From what I can gather (I have not read the book on which this is based), the story has been toned down, but it nonetheless affirms Spielberg as a successful dramatic director. I seriously don’t think I’ve ever cried to many times in one film… oh aside from Edward Scissorhands. 

The film is driven solely by its most memorable and emotional empowering performances from the cast, namely Oprah Winfrey and Danny Glover. 

But it has to be said that the real star of the show was the then relatively unheard of, Whoopi Goldberg. Whoopi’s performance, although without a lot of dialogue, achieved more poignancy and emotional responses in her silence, well-timed smiles, shy laughter, and emotive wide-eyed stares than any Shakespearean monologue. And it’s these empowering performances that keep you completely captivated, completely unaware of the film’s two-hour duration. Now that is something really special. 

Starring Margaret Avery, Danny Glover, Oprah Winfrey, Willard E. Pugh, Akosua Busia, Rae Dawn Chong, Desreta Jackson, and Dana Ivey, The Color Purple is a most enchanting and beautiful film filled with hardships, love, friendship, strength, self-discovery, and an ending so happy and gorgeous that you’ll be crying for hours. I really don’t think that I can describe how absolutely emotionally empowering this movie was, you’ll just have to rush down to your local Blockbuster and get a copy. IT’S ABSOLUTELY BEAUTIFUL!