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BMW M3 E36

Queen and Slim

©️2019 Dr. Fahamu Pecou

I’ve been grooving to Bobby Caldwell’s “What You Won’t Do For Love” for as long as I can remember.

It’s a Black ass song, a two-stepping song. A Big momma Saturday cleaning song. It’s your favorite uncle barbecuing in those “grill master 7s” type song. Which is ironic because Bobby Caldwell is as white as sandwich bread.

The new film Queen and Slim is exquisite on every level. No spoilers here, I assure you. If this movie was a song, we’d be doing the electric slide in the theatres. There are so many beautiful, Black ass moments. Hell! This film itself is a Black-ass moment!

Grammarly is going to flag all of the times i say “Black” in this piece, but it’s an app and it don’t know my life. Besides, it’s essential to the story because Queen and Slim isn’t a white story with Black characters. It’s not an attempt to humanize Black folks. It’s not a marketing ploy to put Black butts in theatres. This film is an eloquent portrait of Blackness. It is both nuanced and obvious, centering specters of Black interiority with deft and depth. There is a visceral authenticity in this portrait of a young, couple on the run from the law. The recent film Harriet feels like fantasy by comparison. Q&S excels in its depictions because it doesn’t water down its characters, nor does it embellish or over-indulge them. The story is relatable and identifiable because it is us, plain and well, not so simple.

Black is beautiful. I don’t just mean in terms of the way Daniel Kaluuya’s and Jodie Turner Smith’s deep, dark skin plays with light. Melina Matsoukas’ visuals are exquisite, from the palette to the details to the angles. I’m not referring to the way Lena Waithe elevates Black idioms and dialect into outright poetry (so many beautiful quotes). Yes, Black is beautiful, but it is also extremely complex. Every scene is dense with the threads of our existence; the hope, the tragedy, the joy, the fear, the familiarity, the isolation, the legacy.

This might help explain why Bobby Caldwell’s entire oeuvre of work is such a conundrum. He made Black music without trying to “act” Black. Essentially what I’m saying is, excellence has no color! Good shit is GOOD SHIT! And we Blacks, love some GOOD SHIT!