Does hating Tyler Perry make me racist?

When Tyler Perry’s film ‘Diary of a Mad Black Woman’ debuted at #1 in February 2005, people were more perplexed than anything. Perry managed to not only best heavy-hitters like Will Smith’s ‘Hitch’ and Keanu Reeves’ ‘Constantine’, but did so grossing over $20 million in its opening weekend alone, instantly making more than four times the film’s original budget. Perry’s success did not stop there. As of 2009, Perry’s movies together have grossed over $400 million.

According to the film’s distributor Lion’s Gate, the audience of Perry’s movies are 90% black, and although there are no official statistics in regards to the religious make-up of the crowd, very evangelical Christian. Some hypothesize that Perry’s success reflects the dearth in films starring, and geared towards African-Americans; and while this may have been true for the first few releases, Perry’s continued popularity indicates that the audience really does like what they see. Contrast that with Spike Lee, whose first films were huge hits with Black American audiences, only to see his box-office returns slowly dwindle. Perry’s films on the other hand seem to only be getting more and more popular. ‘Madea Goes to Jail’, released only a few months ago had a monster $41 million dollars its opening week, his highest yet.

And while Perry’s success has made him a darling of sorts in some circles, Oprah, Will Smith, and Sidney Poitier count themselves as supporters, Perry’s films are amongst the worst reviewed by critics. Perry’s first big hit ‘Diary...’ scored a lowly 16% rating, while his big hit ‘Madea Goes to Jail’ scored a paltry 31%. To explain the discrepancy between Tyler’s popularity and his lack of critical success, many have accused the mostly white fraternity of film critics of racism. Roger Ebert, possibly the worlds most famous and noted film critic, received a barrage of letters accusing him as such, after his scathing one-star review of ‘Diary of a Mad Black Woman’.

Perry fans argued that much of the criticism of Perry’s films stemmed from a misunderstanding of the film’s ‘Black’ aesthetic. Where white audiences saw over the top acting, African-American audiences saw homage to Black stage productions where melodrama was the norm. Perry’s films in fact all originated on stage before being adapted to the big screen. Where white audiences cringed at the drastic shifts in tone and the broad caricatures, Perry’s fans saw the subtle parallels in their own lives with which white audiences could never have been unable to relate.

And yet, while keeping some those valid criticisms of film critics’ critiques of Perry films in mind, one can’t help but remember that his movies are really, really bad.

Like, seriously.

That thought crossed my mind more than a few dozen times while watching Perry’s ‘The Family that Prey’s’ (his most critically lauded film so far, by the way.)

Even while ignoring the amateurish formalistic techniques in Perry’s films, one can’t help but notice that the very themes in and of themselves are ridiculously offensive. Chauvinist, sexist values are at the centre of nearly every Perry movie. Ambitious, independent women are bad, and those who dare to pursue success in their own careers risk the ultimate comeuppance: the inability to find and keep a man. Take for example ‘The Family that Preys’, where the villain is a successful, Ivy-League graduate who has the nerve to put her own career ambition ahead of the wants and needs of her construction-worker husband.

Courtney Young of The Nation helpfully lays out the formula for every Perry film;

 a woman experiences abandonment and/or abuse at the hands of a "bad" man; she takes umbrage, lashing out at those closest to her, most notably a "good" man in her life; she experiences a revelatory moment of change; and she ends the film settled down with the good man who promises her a better life.

In other words, the success and worth o; a woman is determined entirely through a man.

Of course, Perry presents all this through his onscreen alter-ego, ‘Madea’; a confrontational, 74 year-old grandmother with a penchant for pulling a gun on those she argues. Madea is Perry’s twisted ideal of progressive feminism, where loudness, a smart mouth and other superficial representations of ‘strength’ are used as a substitute for actual intelligence and independence.

 While   many liked to point to the disparity between Tyler Perry’s success and his critical unpopularity as an indication of racism, the reality is that there is often a gulf between what is popular with critics and audiences. Transformers II, one of the more popular movies of 2009, grossing nearly a billion dollars worldwide bombed horribly with critics. In fact, I think it’s safe to consider Michael Bay the white Taylor Perry at this point.

A more analogous work to compare to Perry’s films may be Kirk Cameron’s recently released ‘Fireproof’. Kirk Cameron, an evangelical Christian who has found a second career on the lecture circuit comparing the theory of evolution to Nazi ideology, stars in the Christian produced melodrama, which despite its really, really bad reviews, managed to gross over $30 million domestically, making it the highest grossing independent film of 2008. Christian audiences lapped it up, and as of January 2009, the film has made an additional $25 million in DVD sales.

The explanation in the difference between these films critical and commercial success can be found in the manner they were marketed. Perry and Cameron both appealed to markets that for the most part do not attend the movies with much regularity. By targeting relatively unsophisticated movie-watchers, a comparatively low bar of quality has to be met to reach audience approval. It would be like marketing an opera to someone like me; whilst the usual opera goer would recognize the tired and unoriginal, I’d be so impressed with the mere fact a human being could hit such notes that I would walk away with a favourable impression no matter what was happening on stage.