{"id":37225,"date":"2014-09-01T00:33:02","date_gmt":"2014-09-01T00:33:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mixedracestudies.org\/wordpress\/?p=37225"},"modified":"2014-09-01T00:33:02","modified_gmt":"2014-09-01T00:33:02","slug":"belle-a-film-that-defied-expectations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/?p=37225","title":{"rendered":"Belle: A Film That Defied Expectations"},"content":{"rendered":"

Belle: A Film That Defied Expectations<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

The Root<\/a>
\n2014-08-24<\/p>\n

Julie Walker<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

The film\u2019s star and director talked to <\/em>The Root about how an inspirational character helped shaped the movie, which is now out on DVD.<\/em><\/p>\n

Actress Gugu Mbatha-Raw<\/a>, who stars in the movie Belle<\/em><\/a>\u2014now out on DVD\u2014grew up in England watching Jane Austen<\/a> films but never imagined that she would play the lead in a period drama.<\/p>\n

Those films, like the books they were based on, never had black or biracial heroines, but\u00a0Belle<\/i>\u00a0does. The film was inspired by the true story of Dido Elizabeth Belle<\/a>, the daughter of an enslaved African woman and an officer in the British Royal Navy. Belle was raised a free woman in 17th-century England.<\/p>\n

The film opened in May to rave reviews and so far has grossed $10,722,990 (as of Aug. 24, 2014), according to Box Office Mojo. Not bad for a movie that only opened on four screens and had trouble getting made because of the subject matter.<\/p>\n

The film\u2019s star and director talked to The Root<\/em> about how an inspirational character helped shaped the movie, which is now out on DVD.<\/p>\n

Mbatha-Raw told The Root<\/em><\/a> in May, before the film\u2019s U.S. release, that she wanted young girls to be able to see themselves in Belle. \u201cThis is the first time I have seen a period drama with a biracial woman as the lead and it is told from a female British perspective,\u201d said Mbatha-Raw, who has a white English mother and black South African father. \u201cThe film explores issues of identity, race, class and gender, which are very universal themes, but also the film is this sweeping love story. It is such a different perspective, and I think it is important to know as a biracial person myself.\u201d…<\/p>\n

…That director is Amma Asante<\/a>, who is also British. She echoed the same sentiment when The Root<\/em> spoke with her<\/a> before the film\u2019s U.S. premiere.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere was a little girl who looked like me and you, who helped to change the course of our history. That\u2019s a good thing; we can celebrate that,\u201d Asante said.<\/p>\n

It was the idea that a black woman would be the focus that drew Asante to the story. \u201cI feel like it is essential to explore these stories because they are part of what makes us who we are today, and we are all responsible to own our history. We need to tell these stories,\u201d said Asante, who signed on to the project in 2009…<\/p>\n

Read the entire article here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Belle: A Film That Defied Expectations The Root 2014-08-24 Julie Walker The film\u2019s star and director talked to The Root about how an inspirational character helped shaped the movie, which is now out on DVD. Actress Gugu Mbatha-Raw, who stars in the movie Belle\u2014now out on DVD\u2014grew up in England watching Jane Austen films but […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,24,459,8,10],"tags":[15678,15271,15676,17829,3234],"class_list":["post-37225","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles","category-arts","category-history","category-media-archive","category-uk","tag-amma-asante","tag-dido-elizabeth-belle","tag-gugu-mbatha-raw","tag-julie-walker","tag-the-root"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37225","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=37225"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37225\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=37225"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=37225"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=37225"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}