On the Obama-Ization of Will Smith
2009; Issue: 77 Linguagem: Inglês
ISSN
2562-2528
Autores Tópico(s)Comics and Graphic Narratives
ResumoIn Hancock, Will Smith's superhero film of the summer '08 blockbuster season, he plays John Hancock, a superhero who, in spite of his unsightly characteristics, nevertheless uses his super powers to uphold justice in the streets of America. While this is no extraordinary story in itself, what I find to be of note with Hancock is the way that the representations of its protagonist suit its contemporary social context; specifically, I am interested in how Hancock, released roughly four months prior to election day, and with its careful depictions of Will Smith, acted as a sort of de facto campaign ad for Barack Obama, another 'unlikely' hero, often regarded as a quasi-superhero for America. What I'd like to explore here is how, in light of the implications of releasing a film amid election hysteria that casts an African American man as a superhero, the respective images (1) of Will Smith and Obama come to parallel each other. Moreover, I'd like to explore how the development of these images, including the manifestations they take on within culture, cause them to merge, in a sense, thereby problematizing distinctions of identity and the visual forms it takes on. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] A sort of non-superhero, whose unlikeliness itself is present in his vagrant-like appearance, particularly the colour of his skin (he being a sharp contrast to the white, middle- to upper-class Supermans and Batmans that make up the typical superhero grammar) one of the main challenges a character who looks like Hancock faces in playing a superhero is to overcome a less than favourable persona in order satisfy the role itself. This is to say, in spite of his incongruity towards a deeply rooted type, Hancock has to be recognized and viewed as a superhero proper, just as the role of American president, as well, is far from exempt from these challenges of representation (it being another role typified by the upper class white male). Indeed, the notion of a president anything other than white is unprecedented, and was for many, unimaginable (or unacceptable), in spite of all the rhetoric of a purportedly post-racial America. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] From here, I would argue that part of the function Hancock played was to ease the racial concerns of voters with ambivalent conceptions of African Americans (particularly those viewers who draw from a rich repertoire of negative depictions of African Americans in the media, be it from your traditional derogatory representations, or from figures such as Blaxploitation anti-heroes like Shaft and Sweet Sweetback, who, in their assertively afrocentric attitudes are likely to be more discomforting than anything else to many a white viewer (2)). Hancock, despite his adverse appearance and unsavoury characteristics, is nevertheless cast as superhero, and America, post-racial or not, is ultimately better off with the auspices of his superpowers. This scenario, I feel, is reminiscent of much of the story of Obama's candidacy: to be elected into power and deliver change for the better, he has had to gain the trust and support of so much of an American population that still, on a conscious level or otherwise, typecasts blacks into the roles of an inferior other (which is to say not as their president). In short, Hancock plays out many of the anxieties concerning whether a black man can be trusted as president, as by re-presenting these racial tensions in a film (3) that shuffles the instituted structure of character types and roles, it attempts to ease such tensions by questioning them; in other words, despite the widely held negative and essentialist conceptions of African Americans, they can be superheroes, and they can be presidents. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] The situation, however, becomes especially curious with the arrival of the ads for Will Smith's latest film, Seven Pounds, particularly its promotional poster (first advertised roughly a month after the election): a close up shot of a suit-and-tied Will Smith, well groomed, and with a stately countenance that I wouldn't hesitate to call 'presidential'. …
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