Interracial Relationships in Mississippi Masala - Movie Review Example

Interracial relationships in Mississippi Masala Mira Nair’s 1991 Mississippi Masala has for its central subject the relationship of an African American man and an Indian American woman and the filial opposition that they face to the same. The essay shall attempt to understand the politics of identity shaped through racial discrimination and the manner in which the characters respond to the same through enduring interracial relationships. The focus shall be on three key parts of the film- the family’s displacement from Uganda owing to the “Africa for the Africans” ethnic cleansing movement started by the dictator Idi Amin and their friendship with Okelo, the racism prevalent within historically marginalized groups seen in the stigma against dark skin within the Indian family and the manner in which the relationship between Mina and Demetrius reveals the racism embedded within their respective families. The backdrop is significantly the Mississippi countryside with a long history of slavery and institutionalized racism, the lingering effects of which continue to inform the film’s thematic concerns. The forced immigration of Mina’s family from Uganda is a deliberate backdrop to the romance between Mina and Demetrius. The intolerance that the Indian family faces in the dictatorial regime of Idi Amin quite ironically does not render them (albeit Mina) more egalitarian in their views on race. Despite their close personal ties with the nation of Uganda and their relationship with Okelo, a man who ensures their safe departure amidst much racial profiling and persecution at severe personal risk, their reluctance to accept their daughter’s relationship with an African American man shows the way in which racial intolerance can dwell in vicious cycles. In a somewhat similar episode from the film, the figure of the Indian hotel owner is shown to express a phoney notion of unity between people of colour when he faces the threat a potential lawsuit from Demetrius and Tyrone. This apparent camaraderie is shattered when meet Mina and Demetrius in Biloxi and learns of their affair. He defames Demetrious and robs him of much of his business. Demetrius in turn files the lawsuit that he has earlier agreed to forego on goodwill further deepening the hostility between the two communities. Mina’s broadmindedness perhaps stems from the marginality that she experiences as a dark-skinned person within Indian American social circles. In a significant instance during a family ceremony, a female relative remarks of Mina’s apparently dismal marital prospects that one can either be light-skinned and poor or dark and rich but certainly not, as Mina is, both poor and dark. It is this peculiar, yet deep-rooted racism within her family that leads Mina to seek individuality, freedom and above all, love outside the deterministic bounds of family and ethnicity. It is also in this strain that film shows Mina to be frequently mistaken for a Latina. This fluidity of identity, fortified by her relationship with Demetrius, makes her a hybrid person, one who challenges conservative notions of regional, racial and linguistic homogeneity. The film’s title reiterates its political and social message of hybridity as well as tensions which brew beneath the surfaces of multicultural societies. The incongruity of Indian spices, with connotations of romance as well hostility and anger when juxtaposed with one of the most conservative states of the U.S. seems to herald the beginning of an American, and even global society where interracial relationships far from raising eyebrows shall become the norm, rendering the very notion of racial “purity” passé. The film combines many strands of history. Its setting in the Old South is a constant reminder of the horrors of slavery and the devastating consequences of racial intolerance and violence. It is perhaps not an insignificant detail that Demetrius’ family is essentially working class and their carpet cleaning business struggles against the lingering effects of racism. It is important to take cognizance of the fact that the film shows the steady evolution of its protagonists. Demetrius’ initial interest in Mina arises from an interest in angering his former girlfriend. However, through the course of their relationship and opposition faced therein he realizes an entirely different kind of bigotry-sexism-that he practices in the early phase of his relationship with Mina. It is tempting to consider the film as one which is about individuals rather than race whereby Demetrius’ and Mina’s racial belongings are only incidental to the development of the plot. The essay would however argue in favour of the contrary. Their relationship has for its base, besides obvious physical and emotional attraction, an understanding of shared marginality. It may be well argued that it propels them to question the status quo regarding the structures of gender, race and class through which are identities are arbitrarily shaped. Thus, Demetrius responds to Jay’s opposition to his relationship with his daughter by stating in a line which in many ways forms the root of the film- “You and your daughter aren't but a few shades lighter than this” (Nair, Mississippi Masala). The statement exposes the sheer irrationality of racial prejudice, particularly in a nation such as the USA where racial hybridity is extremely widespread. It is important to note that the film does not end on a note of reconciliation between the families of the lovers but rather with them driving off to find their own. This coincides with Jay, Mina’s father, winning a lawsuit regarding his seized property in Uganda which leads him to return to the place of his birth in Kampala. It is thus an end which celebrates unlikely pairings and heterogeneity and rejects bigotry of all kinds. This might seem to some as an elision of the film’s engagement with politics as it lapses into a seemingly simple, romantic resolution. However, the political and the romantic are not antithetical as argued above in Nair’s film. The dénouement is not oversimplified for it remains fraught with uncertainties, for Mina and Demetrius as well as for Jay. as they reclaim their right over their identities, the threat of social and political censure lingers on, establishing thereby a universal truth of struggles between the individual and the society. Work Cited Nair, Mira, dir. Mississippi Masala. Black River Productions, 1991. Film. Read More