Media That Made Me Feel Seen

Listening to a recent podcast episode in which the hosts discuss their favorite queer and nonqueer movies had me reflecting this week (Food 4 Thot episode 26 "Thots! Camera! Action!!!" 03/04/2018). One of the themes they keep coming back to in both categories is movies that made them feel seen/understood/represented/real-in-the-world. It made me wonder about my own favorites and some scenes immediately came to mind:

1. Beauty and the Beast
   
   
   This is one of the first that came to mind especially in childhood. While there wasn't a ton of good representation for little Black girls, Belle's love of reading and obliviousness to the social norms expected of her spoke so deeply to me as a little kid, as well as the Beast's hope for someone to love him despite his ferocious demeanor and inhuman appearance. I could already feel the pressures of the "normal girl" trope that Belle was subjected to and could already feel that I might not totally fit into that racially, sexually, and genderly (sp? idek) and the ways that could put me outside of access to love, similar to the Beast. Despite the Stockholm's Syndrom-y context of the movie, both main characters encapsulated dreams and emotions I wouldn't know how to recognize in myself or verbalize to others for years to come. 
2. The Color Purple
   
   
   I saw The Color Purple for the first time at about 17 or 18 years old when I was first acknowledging to myself that I was attracted to women as well as men (nonbinary/genderqueer concepts and vocabulary were just beginning to swirl around my atmosphere and something I hadn't even begun to fully consider). At the same time, I was also growing both closer to and farther from my own sisters as we recovered from the death of our mother a few years before. Either way, Celie was me on the screen if I was born 80~ years ago; I could feel it. Her vulnerability, her entrapment, her lack of self-worth, her desire for love and recognition and intimacy, even the ways that she wronged other women around her. The level of representation actually broke me and put a mirror up to my heart so I could no longer be in denial. The movie exposed my deepest longings at a time that I could actually process what was going on. The blackness and southernness and queerness of the movie helped bypass a lot of the mental barriers that Beauty and the Beast couldn't. The whole time I watched, I wanted to hold Celie in my arms and be held by her and it's a feeling that intensified once I read the book.
3. Jane Eyre
   
   
   I initially read Jane Eyre the book and so a lot of my feelings about the book transferred to the movie and are at this point in my memory interchangeable. Like Beauty and the Beast, Jane embodied many of my hopes and my idea of my ideal self. Jane is a plain woman, educated and artistic without being a standout talent, and a governess, therefore in this strange almost middle-class position of not being destitute but nowhere near wealthy or independent. Her desire for love and connection is apparent, but her most standout characteristic to me was her spine of steel. Even in the face of having everything she desired about to be handed to her on a platter, she refused to excuse Rochester's infidelity and dishonesty. While I tend to that same indomitability, the fact that the story rewards her for that integrity was particularly sweet. Jane is not willing to compromise herself even for the things that she wants (which in reality are only the appearance of that which she wants whether it's Rochester or St. John. She wants love, honest love, and is willing to be by herself instead of accepting second best. Reading/watching Jane Eyre made me feel I could be true to myself, even in the face of her relatively privileged social position compared to mine. (Also the soundtrack by Dario Marianelli is to die for!) 
• I would be remiss if I didn't mention the spirituality, both in Jane Eyre and in The Color Purple. That layer of resonance along with the personalities, desires, geographical locations, economic positions, etc. really sealed the deal when it came to identifying with the characters and feeling like somewhere in space and time someone had understood someone like me. While I definitely lean more towards Jane's expression of orthodox Christianity than Celie's pantheistic spirituality, the fact that this connection to God is what sustained both characters through hurts and betrayals and that they felt like there was a deep connection at all, resonated with my own personal experiences of spirituality.
• It should also be noted that I deeply prefer Charlotte Gainsbourg's portrayal of Jane Eyre but also deeply prefer the cinematography, music, and pacing of the most recent Jane Eyre movie (with the Dario Marianelli soundtrack and Michael Fassbender as Rochester *swoon*)
4. Lemonade
   
   
   Ugh, what to say about Lemonade. That whooooole experience was lifegiving to me. The scenery that felt lifted from my own tri-state area the African-Southern American-Womanness of it all and with a persistent tone of the gothic dripping in every scene!? Southern Black women being shown on screen as beautiful, as frightening, as in touch with the spiritual even in an atmospheric way, as tender, and lovable, earthy, I don't even know... It was so much.
5. Anne with an 'E'
   
   
   There isn't much to say about Anne with an 'E' that I haven't said about Beauty and the Beast and Jane Eyre. By now, you've probably figured out that I have a thing for spunky historical girl heroes who love to read and want adventures, including the adventures of romantic and familial love. Something about that trope calls to me from the inside and I wish other people could see me the way I see me, as another one of these cherished characters full of *imagination* and emotional expansiveness, as deserving of love, professional fulfillment, and friendship, as someone that deserves to take up room and also has so much to give.

Probably a sphere of representation that I haven't connected much with is the area of size. I am not a small person, and it often feels like my size os one of the main barriers to being seen for who I really am by others. One of the movies in my to watch list, that may eventually join this list and address that discrepancy, is Bessie, starring Queen Latifah. Bessie is the biopic produced by HBO by Dee Rees about the jazz singer Bessie Smith, and I am looking forward to watching it! I'll probably watch it over the Christmas break and write a response here.