Malcolm and the abuse of Marie.
In 2021, Sam Levinson released a Netflix movie entirely in black and white, which is very film-snob of him to do so, considering that the overall product was not good.
Malcolm and Marie is a film starring John David Washington and Zendaya about a half-Black woman being abused verbally by her Black filmmaker boyfriend, who takes advantage of her vulnerability. That’s all you need to know because there is no plot. I am aware that Sam created this film for Zendaya, and their friendship is not my business, but the issue strongly focuses on how awful her character was treated in this film. So many of Malcolm’s complaints in the movie were about white people not understanding his craft. Malcolm’s barely there story is about his race, and Marie’s arguments with him counterpointed that. If he wanted to make a movie about a Black filmmaker and his mixed-race girlfriend, he should have been the last to write this screenplay.
This was not Sam’s story to tell; if anything, this was a bit of an avatar movie, and Malcolm was him on screen. Sam has always been dragged to hell and back for the way he chooses to write girls, women, and people of color: we can conclude that Malcolm and Marie was a gigantic middle finger to everyone who’s ever said anything negative about his writing overall. I understand being protective of your work, and yes, sometimes people are just mean. Still, these criticisms of Sam’s writing stem from the fact that he feels he does a great job of writing people who aren’t straight white men when everyone who isn’t a straight white man tells him there are flaws within the storytelling. What’s more disturbing about Malcolm is that Levinson included an arc about Malcolm complaining about white people not understanding his work. It’s unsettling because, from paying attention to Levinson’s productions, he is obsessed with Black aesthetics involving non-Black characters, including hairstyles, music choices, references, and fashion pieces. Let’s not forget that Assassination Nation ends with a Black marching band performing. They contributed nothing to the story; they were just there playing their instruments and dancing.
Three-forths of Malcolm and Marie is just a Black man (whom Sam used to portray him somewhat) verbally abusing a mixed-race woman. Malcolm does not thank her; he goes on about how he’s done so much for her with her drug addiction and makes her feel she isn’t anything without him. While this movie showed Zendaya’s strengths as an actor, it also contributed to the same ongoing problem Levinson has when portraying female characters, especially those who aren’t entirely white. Sam has no issue brutalizing these people within his work, all for it to go nowhere; there’s little depth. Once again, this was a film that people watched for the actors over him, but even the actors could not save how poorly written their characters were.
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