Color Purple is a Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by African-American writer Alice Walker, whose magnificent 1985 film emerged from the hands of brilliant director Steven Spielberg and shows us a story about ethnic identity, gender roles, domestic violence, female solidarity and deep trauma.
The whole film is a masterpiece that can be analyzed in several areas: scene design, beautiful script, incredible photography and an extraordinary cast of actors. Early development of deep trauma, solidarity and language through writing are the keys to this story of hope and self-improvement.
- Alice Walker masterfully captured a terrible reality.
- Very recent and close.
- That affected millions of people who simply couldn’t cope.
- At a time when it seems that the color of the skin and the place of women in society are once again generating controversy.
- We want to remember this magnificent film.
- Which must be resumed to refresh a memory that.
- At times.
- Seems weakened.
The film, set in the early 20th century, in the southern United States, focuses on the life of Celie, dominated by Whoopi Goldberg, a 14-year-old girl who is often raped by her own father, from whom she became pregnant twice, her children have been given up for adoption and the whole thing is being lived in full normality.
The family eventually married him to a widower his father’s age. The role of Celia, and therefore of all the women in history, is that of a type of animal that cares for the house, the children, and serves as an object of life. sexual relief The only way for Celia to find a way to live with this are letters she begins to write to God (because she believes she is the only one she knows exists) and that she continues to write to her sister Nettie, from whom she was forcible. What happens to Celie is a gradual defragmentation of you.
It is five African-American women who bring this cruel story of abuse, contempt, absolute loss of identity and struggle for knowledge and to find their place in life.
“I’m poor, I’m black, maybe ugly and I can’t cook,” a voice told everyone I wanted to hear. But am I here?-Celie, the purple color
The film shows how dissociative trauma develops through many violent events of a physical, sexual and psychological nature, this type of trauma is typical of cases of post-traumatic stress and sexual abuse, at any age, but mainly in childhood and adolescence.
This disorder often presents emotional paralysis as a symptom: a way to isolate yourself from the negative emotions caused by memories of a traumatic event. When the event is constantly played and played back in time, the consequences can be devastating. Dissociation is a defense mechanism with incapacity effects that block memory and transfer trauma to the body, expressed through emotions, impulses or loss of control, speech or many other forms of body language.
Fragmentation that accompanies a traumatic experience occurs when trauma completely destroys the self-protection system, there is a disconnection in the connection with their environment and attachments, which significantly affects the perception of safety and self-esteem of the individual.
it shows a reality experienced by millions of women around the world: situations of sexual abuse and physical and psychological violence from an early age, which in many cases is a group-specific trauma Women who have had their rights violated and who have had to adopt a mental survival strategy.
The group’s specific traumas, especially in women, are related to objectation, a process that dehumanizes people, shows them as non-thinking objects that can be explored, exposed and used on a whim.
The person who suffers from this type of abuse may unconsciously choose to mentally separate from the suffering self to preserve a part of himself. If maintained over time, it is a strategy that usually causes profound harm to the person; this gap that is opening up is not easy to bridge with an intervention. This is one more reason why preventive measures are important.