Posted by The Certain Ones in MOVIE REVIEWS | 1 Comment
For Colored Girls
Review by Janice Jones
This month’s movie review is on an older movie in my repertoire. This month I am going to review For Colored Girls, which is Tyler Perry’s screen adaptation of the award winning stage play fully titled For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow is Enuf by Ntozake Shange. The movie stars, Phylicia Rashad, Janet Jackson, Thandie Newton, Kerry Washington, Kimberly Elise, Loretta Devine, Whoopi Goldberg, Anika Noni Rose and Tessa Thompson. With the exception of Phylicia Rashad’, each of the stars character’s and their pain is represented by a color of the rainbow as respectively listed here in order; red, orange, blue, brown, green, white, yellow, purple.
The movie is centered on nine women, all who suffer from various issues, traumas and drama in their lives. With the exception of a mother and her two daughters, there is no personal connection between the women. Each of the women have individual stories and initially only intersect on occasion on a purely professional level. However, as the movie progresses, you find that their lives become intertwined by one horrific event. Throughout the movie, the character’s recite lines from the original stage play which is a composition of more than 20 poems. It is a powerful film filled with sadness, regret, dreams crushed and deferred, blame, shame, remorse, anger, bitterness and pain; lots and lots of pain. Yet, behind all of the storms, there is still just a hint of the rainbow at the end of the movie. I would definitely recommend this movie, but in an effort to get the most out of it, be sure to view it with a heart that will be wrenched, a soul that is prepared to be shaken, a mind that must be kept open and a spirit that is willing to forgive. 
Most of the women are victims who suffer in the present as a result of pain not properly healed from their past. They all are victims of wounds inflicted upon them by someone they trusted once upon a time. Each of them at some point in the movie has to come to the realization that they must stand face to face with their “enemies”. They must acknowledge them, confront them, defeat them, forgive them, and move on with their lives without the debilitating effects of the poison injected into them by those demons. The demons and enemies in this movie ran the gamut. There was rape, childhood sexual molestation, domestic violence, sexually transmitted diseases, homosexuality, teen pregnancy, mental illness and abortion, amongst others I may not have noticed.
For Colored Girls brings to my mind the scripture in 2 Corinthians 4:8-9, which (after some paraphrasing on my part) says “I was pressed on every side, but God did not allow me to be crushed. I was most definitely perplexed and confused, but God did not allow me to stay in despair. I was judged and persecuted, but God did not abandon me. I was struck down, but God did not leave me that way. He did not allow my situation to destroy me. God saw treasure in me, housed in fragile but unbreakable clay jar.”
A few years ago, I was at a conference listening to one of the speakers, Bishop Liston Page. On the night he spoke, he said something that forever changed the way I looked at the things I had endured in my past. He said “we are sometimes the victim of God’s purpose.” Now I don’t know what that means to you when you hear me say it, but when I heard Bishop Page say it, I immediately understood that all I had suffered in my past and as a result of my past happened so I could today tell you all about it and show you that it didn’t take me out. And so it was with all the ladies in this movie. They suffered. They endured. And they all came out, alive and growing stronger. I believe the initial first steps on their individual roads to healing began when they started opening up and talking about their pain. They started to share with each other what they considered their personal shame. Their sharing is what led to them breaking the bondage and yoke of their misery. The Holy Spirit dropped this quote I now claim as my own in my spirit a couple of years ago: “Transparency is a giant step on the road to deliverance. The devil cannot control you or keep you bound but what you are not too ashamed to tell.” The Bible says in John 8:32, “And you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”
God is still in the business of healing and freeing His children today. Despite the heartache you have suffered, you too are still his treasures no matter the color of your pain or the hue of your unbreakable clay jar.
My name is Janice Jones. I was born July 6, 1966 in Detroit, Michigan. I lived in the great state of Michigan until August, 2007, when I moved to Phoenix, Arizona. I am the mother of two sons, Jerrick & Derrick Parker, and grandmother to Jevon Jerrick Parker. https://www.facebook.com/Jnycethewriter
I loved this review! And I enjoyed the movie on so many levels. I went with my mother and my mother kept referring that I was Janet Jackson’s character…not sure if that is good or bad.