[NFBNJ] Fwd: The Color Purple

Thu Jun 2 00:08:12 UTC 2022

Movie Night with the NFB of SC! On Friday, June 3, 2022 at 8:00 PM Eastern
we will be showing the audio described movie The Color Purple!

Run Time: 2 hours and 33 minutes

Rating: TV PG

More about the movie is below the Zoom information you will need to join
us.

Click here to view the National Federation of the Blind of SC 2021 PSA!
<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H4awrn7eddQ&t=16s>

Federation Center Zoom

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/8032543777?pwd=QTVQd2RzN3l6QnNmZ0FmSnp6NG8vQT09

Meeting ID: 803 254 3777 Passcode: 124578

One tap mobile +19292056099,,8032543777# US (New York)

Celie is a young poor, uneducated 14-year-old African-American teenager
girl living in the Southern United States in the early 1900s. She writes
letters to God because her father, Alphonso, beats and rapes her. Alphonso
has already impregnated Celie once, which resulted in the birth of a girl,
Olivia, whom Alphonso abducted. Celie believes that Alphonso killed Olivia.
Celie then has a second child, and Celie's ailing mother dies after cursing
Celie on her deathbed. The second child is a boy named Adam, whom Alphonso
takes from Celie shortly after his birth.

Celie and her younger sister, 12-year-old Nettie, learn that a man
identified only as "Mister" wants to marry Nettie. Alphonso refuses to let
Nettie marry, instead arranging for Mister to marry Celie. Mister, a
widower, needing someone to care for his own two children and keep his own
house clean, eventually accepts the offer. Mister physically, sexually, and
verbally abuses Celie, and his two children mistreat her as well.

Shortly thereafter, Nettie runs away from Alphonso and takes refuge at
Celie's house, where Mister makes sexual advances toward her. Celie then
advises Nettie to seek assistance from a well-dressed black woman whom she
saw in the general store a while back; unbeknownst to Celie, the woman
adopted Olivia, and she is the only black woman Celie has ever seen with
money of her own. Nettie is forced to leave after promising to write.
Celie, however, never receives any letters and concludes that her sister
Nettie is dead.

Time passes, and Harpo, Mister's son, falls in love with an assertive girl
named Sofia, who becomes pregnant with Harpo's baby and, despite initial
resistance from Mister, marries Harpo. Harpo and Sofia have five more
children in short order. Celie is amazed by Sofia's defiant refusal to
submit to Harpo's attempts to control her. As Harpo is kinder and gentler
than his father, Celie advises him not to dominate Sofia. Harpo temporarily
follows Celie's advice but falls back under Mister's sway. Celie,
momentarily envious of Harpo's genuine love of Sofia, then advises Harpo to
beat her. Sofia fights back, however, and confronts Celie. A guilty Celie
apologizes and confides in Sofia about all the abuse she suffers at
Mister's hands. She also begins to consider Sofia's advice about defending
herself against further abuse from Mister.

Shug Avery, a jazz and blues singer and Mister's long-time mistress, falls
ill, and Mister takes her in. Celie, who has been fascinated by photos of
Shug that she found in Mister's belongings, is thrilled to have her there.
Mister's father expresses disapproval of the arrangement, reminding Mister
that Shug has three out-of-wedlock children, though Mister implies to him
that he is those children's father, upon which Mister's father leaves in
disgust. While Shug is initially rude to Celie, who has taken charge of
nursing her, the two become friends, and Celie soon finds herself
infatuated with Shug.

Frustrated by Harpo's domineering behavior, Sofia moves out, taking her
children with her. Several months later, Harpo opens a juke joint where a
fully recovered Shug performs nightly. Shug decides to stay when she learns
that Mister beats Celie when she is away. Shug and Celie grow closer.

Sofia returns for a visit and promptly gets into a fight with Harpo's new
girlfriend, Squeak, knocking Squeak's teeth out. In town one day, while
Sofia is enjoying a day out with her new boyfriend, a prizefighter, and
their respective children, she gets into a physical altercation with the
mayor after his wife, Miss Millie, insults Sofia and her children. The
police arrive and brutally beat Sofia, leaving her with a cracked skull,
broken ribs, her face rendered nearly unrecognizable, and blind in one eye.
She is subsequently sentenced to 12 years in prison.

Squeak, mixed-race and Sheriff Hodges' illegitimate niece, attempts to
blackmail the sheriff into releasing Sofia, resulting in her being raped by
her uncle. Squeak cares for Sofia's children while she is incarcerated, and
the two women develop a friendship. Sofia is eventually released and begins
working for Miss Millie, which she detests.

Despite being newly married to a man called Grady, Shug instigates a sexual
relationship with Celie on her next visit. One night Shug asks Celie about
her sister, and Shug helps Celie recover letters from Nettie that Mister
has been hiding from her for decades. The letters indicate that Nettie
befriended a missionary couple, Samuel and Corrine, the well-dressed woman
Celie saw in the store. Nettie eventually accompanied them to Africa to do
missionary work, Samuel and Corrine having unwittingly adopted both Adam
and Olivia. Corrine, noticing her adopted children resemble Nettie, wonders
if Samuel fathered the children with Nettie. Increasingly suspicious,
Corrine tries to limit Nettie's role in her family.

Through her letters, Nettie reveals she has become disillusioned with her
missionary work. Corrine became ill with a fever, and Nettie asked Samuel
to tell her how he adopted Olivia and Adam. Realizing Adam and Olivia are
Celie's children, Nettie then learned Alphonso is actually her and Celie's
stepfather. Their actual father was a store owner that white men lynched
because they resented his success. She also learned their mother suffered a
mental collapse after her husband's death and that Alphonso exploited the
situation to control their mother's considerable wealth.

Nettie confesses to Samuel and Corrine she is the children's biological
aunt. The gravely ill Corrine refuses to believe her until Nettie reminds
her of her previous encounter with Celie in the store. Later, Corrine dies,
finally having accepted Nettie's story. Meanwhile, Celie visits Alphonso,
who confirms Nettie's story. Celie begins to lose some of her faith in God,
which she confides to Shug, who explains to Celie her own unique religious
philosophy. Shug helps Celie realize that God is not someone who has power
over her like the rest of the men in Celie's life. Rather, God is an “it”
and not a “who."

Having had enough of her husband's abuse, Celie decides to leave Mister
along with Shug and Squeak, who is considering a singing career of her own.
Celie puts a curse on Mister before leaving him for good, settling in
Tennessee and supporting herself as a seamstress.

Alphonso dies, Celie inherits his land, and moves back into her childhood
home. Around this time, Shug falls in love with Germaine, a member of her
band, and this news crushes Celie. Shug travels with Germaine, all the
while writing postcards to Celie. Celie pledges to love Shug even if Shug
does not love her back.

Celie learns that Mister, suffering from a considerable decline in fortunes
after Celie left him, has changed dramatically, and Celie begins to call
him by his first name, Albert. Albert proposes that they marry "in the
spirit as well as in the flesh," but Celie declines.

Meanwhile, Nettie and Samuel marry and prepare to return to America. Before
they leave, Adam marries Tashi, an African girl. Following an African
tradition, Tashi undergoes the painful rituals of female circumcision and
facial scarring. In solidarity, Adam undergoes the same facial scarring
ritual.

As Celie realizes that she is content in her life without Shug, Shug
returns, having ended her relationship with Germaine. Nettie, Samuel,
Olivia, Adam, and Tashi all arrive at Celie's house. Nettie and Celie
reunite after 30 years and introduce one another to their respective
families.

Critical reception

-- 

Warmly,
Linda Melendez, President
National Federation of the Blind of New Jersey
732-421-7063
president at nfbnj.org
www.nfbnj.org
Facebook: https://m.facebook.com/NFB-NJ-353099574776238
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