Rating summary

Movie		3.5
Video		4.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		3.0
Overall		3.5

Dear White People Blu-ray Movie Review

Deer in the headlights maybe.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman February 2, 2015

Dear White People is a decidedly odd combination of incendiary material offered with a curiously tamped down if often long winded presentation style. The film makes a lot of piquant observations about race relations, both internecine (i.e., largely between blacks) and intramural (i.e., between blacks and whites) on the campus of a hoity toity Ivy League college named Winchester University. Seemingly meant to intentionally evoke memories of entries like Spike Lee’s School Daze, Dear White People is undeniably smart, but like a lot of nerds, tends to outstay its welcome while at the same time repeatedly drawing attention to just how intelligent it really is. The film follows a handful of students going through various crises at the school, most of which combine serious subject matter delivered in a wryly comedic fashion. Sam White (Tessa Thompson) hosts a local radio program called “Dear White People” where she upbraids the Caucasian student body with reprimands about their behavior, especially as it relates to blacks. When Sam almost inadvertently wins the presidency at her local dorm, the housing unit traditionally inhabited by black students, a domino effect is put into motion where several other students’ lives are affected. Sam’s militancy is both despised and appreciated, by both whites and blacks, but ultimately pits student against student in what amounts to a low level “race war.”

Much as there’s an apparently intentional disconnect between some of the inflammatory subject matter and its presentation in Dear White People, there are other somewhat disjointed elements in the film. On the one hand, the film indulges in twee descriptors for some characters (see screenshot 11), while at the same time trying to make supposedly “serious” statements about black identity and interracial relations. There are also odd little elements like Sam’s surname—is her black militancy an overcompensation for her “caucasian” last name? Perhaps to its credit, though, Dear White People seems to want to mock the pretensions of an upwardly mobile black constituency while at the same time making a case for a clear, consistent black identity (something that may be well nigh impossible given the spectrum of personality types on display throughout the film).

While the film may not gel particularly well, there are a number of well done vignettes that feature various characters. Sam’s initial nemesis to head the Armstrong Parker House (the residence where blacks typically live) is Troy Fairbanks (Brandon P. Bell), who just so happens to be the son of Winchester’s Dean (Dennis Haysbert). Troy is the sort of well put together young black man that even your bigoted (white) uncle might not mind that much if he ended up dating your sister. In fact, Troy is dating a white girl, Sofia Fletcher (Brittany Curran), leading to one of Sam’s snarkier broadcasts about white girls who date blacks to get back at their parents (Sofia's brother and father play into various subplots as well). Also stuffed into the interwoven plot strands is gay would be journalist Lionel Higgins (Tyler James Williams), a perennial outcast who has bounced from dorm to dorm but who suddenly finds himself front and center once Sam’s activities at Armstrong Parker start to cause waves around campus. Sam also has a bit of a female nemesis in Coco Conners (Teyonah Parris), a seemingly vicious “mean girl” whose highest aspiration is to get cast in a reality show that is having auditions on campus, something that becomes more difficult when Sam steals the spotlight.

If Dear White People is never much more than the sum of its parts, many of those parts are deliciously amusing. Sam offers a hilarious “remake” of The Birth of a Nation geared toward the Age of Obama, and I must say as a white guy who has relentlessly disparaged Tyler Perry’s films, it was absolutely refreshing to see a bunch of blacks more or less echoing my increasing frustration with the Energizer Bunny antics of Madea. A lot of Dear White People works in the moment, but writer-director Justin Simien is better microcosmically than macrocosmically, offering neat little vignettes that never quite weave together into a satisfying whole.

There’s little doubt that Simien is a talent to watch, though, for the dialectic espoused throughout the film is often whip smart and at the very least wryly humorous if not always laugh out loud hilarious. In fact for such a verbose (one shies away from saying “articulate”) film, Dear White People never really plays like a screed, despite Sam’s pigheadedness about what the right way to do things is.

Dear White People Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Dear White People is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Lionsgate Films with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.78:1. Shot digitally with the Red Epic, Dead White People has an appealingly sharp and clear picture, but it's pretty much devoid of any significant "wow" factor. The tony climes of Winchester University mean a lot of burnished browns as in the ubiquitous paneling inside the school, and even the interior of Sam's broadcast studio is kind of drab looking, something that's only exacerbated by typically very dim lighting in those sequences. When the film ventures out of doors on bright sunlit days, the palette does perk up considerably (see screenshot 14), but never overwhelmingly so. Contrast is consistent though some may be somewhat underwhelmed by the digital capture of the more dimly lit scenes, elements that can oftentimes look murky. There are no issues with image instability or artifacts on this pleasing presentation.

Dear White People Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Dear White People's lossless DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 perks up measurably through the use of source cues and in crowded scenes like the dining hall in Armstrong Parker or, later, the raucous party. The bulk of the film, though, features dialogue and quite a bit of voice over by Sam that doesn't really exploit the surround channels in any meaningful way. Fidelity remains excellent and dynamic range is rather wide for an ostensible comedy.

Dear White People Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• The Making of Dear White People (1080p; 20:09) is a pretty standard EPK, though the interviews are entertaining.


• "Get Your Life" Music Video by Caught a Ghost (1080p; 5:14) also includes a brief introduction Tessa Thompson.


• Deleted Scenes (1080p; 2:36)


• Outtakes (1080p; 5:08)


• The More You Know [About Black People] (1080p; 5:09) is a compendium of various short faux PSAs a la NBC's "The More You Know" series.


• Racism Insurance (1080p; 2:57) does much the same parodying, this time with a conceit that apes the State Farm Insurance commercials where singing a jingle gets you instant help.


• Dvrs App: Black Friends When You Need Them (1080p; 2:56) is more satire, this time focusing on an app that will provide you with black friends.


• Leaked: Banned Winchester U Diversity (1080p; 2:21) is a fake promotional video for the university.


• Audio Commentaries:

  Writer-Director Justin Simien, with Actors Tessa Thompson, Tyler James Williams, Teyonah Parris and Brandon Bell is more of a gabfest reunion, with some fun anecdotes.

  
  

  Writer-Director Justin Simien is the more analytical and ruminative of the two commentaries, though Simien states up front that he'd rather let the viewer establish his or her own relationship with the film rather than having it dictated by Simien, and so there's quite a bit of dead space on this one.

Dear White People Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Some of the supplements included on this Blu-ray suggest that there was almost a sketch like approach considered at one time (that is, if one assumes these supplements were initially planned to be part of the finished film in some form). That approach may in fact have ultimately worked better than Simien's attempt to weave the more whimsical and outrageously satirical elements into a more anchored story about race relations on a modern college campus. There's a lot of good material here, but better shaping and integration (no pun intended) could have helped the sometimes unwieldy structure. Technical merits are strong, the supplemental package is fun, and Dear White People comes Recommended.