Beauty in Black: Mindless Entertainment
Directed by Tyler Perry
“You think this is a game? I’m in.”
Kimmie
Beauty in Black, debuted in 2024, is one of Tyler Perry’s most recent releases with Netflix. The series follows a stripper with a tumultuous life, who ends up in a dangerous position with a wealthy yet dysfunctional family. Sprinkled throughout is a mélange of nudity, misogyny, exploitation and hypersexuality with brainless characters that are stereotyped as being within the black community. They seem to have no real motive behind their actions besides drugs, money, and prostitution. Also, it does not help that there seems to be no distinction between the behaviors and decisions of any individual character.
The characters seem to be caricatures of real people and the acting is very subpar. They seem to use endless profanity and essentially ‘gang’ up on the protagonist simply because the plot calls for it. Most of the problems faced are contrived instead of a more realistic means to move the story along. This series highlights the most negative aspects of the black community. It supports the harmful stereotypes we criticize the media for promoting. How can the black community accuse them of this when what we are given to consume visually are terrible characters without redeemable qualities all crafted by a wealthy, black man. The dialogue is a beast within itself as it is uninspired and very on-the-nose. It simply tells the audience everything, leaving nothing to be discerned. The soundtrack seems to be comprised of the most generic rap songs available. Many scenes were filmed unnecessarily and made no sense upon viewing.
This series was never meant to become a classic in cinematic history. At the least, it have been digestible. I would never recommend anyone to waste their time on this mindless, trite series.
The Island Cinephile 
