Nicole Byer Archives – CULTURE MIX

Review: ‘The American Society of Magical Negroes,’ starring Justice Smith, David Alan Grier, An-Li Bogan, Drew Tarver, Michaela Watkins, Aisha Hinds, Rupert Friend and Nicole Byer

March 16, 2024

by Carla Hay

“The American Society of Magical Negroes”

Directed by Kobi Libii

Culture Representation: Taking place in Los Angeles (and briefly in New York City), the comedy/drama film “The American Society of Magical Negroes” features a racially diverse cast of characters (African American, white and a few Asian and Latin people) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.

Culture Clash: A struggling artist is recruited to work for the secretive American Society of Magical Negroes, whose purpose is to make white people comfortable, in order to prevent black people from getting harassed and killed.

Culture Audience: “The American Society of Magical Negroes” will appeal primarily to people who don’t mind watching inept and boring racial satires.

An-Li Bogan and Justice Smith in “The American Society of Magical Negroes” (Photo by Tobin Yelland/Focus Features)

“The American Society of Magical Negroes” could have been a clever and incisive comedy/drama about how racial stereotypes on screen can affect people in real life. Unfortunately, this dull and mishandled racial satire has bland characters, a weak story and stale jokes that repeatedly miss the mark. This terrible misfire also fails at spoofing romantic comedies.

Writer/director Kobi Libii makes his feature-film debut with “The American Society of Magical Negroes,” which had its world premiere at the 2024 Sundance Film Festival. “The American Society of Magical Negroes” squanders the talent of its impressive cast by putting them in a movie that is as timid and insecure as its lead character. A movie poking fun at racial stereotypes needs to be bold and self-assured in what it has to say, instead of lazily filling up the story with derivative and unfunny scenes that have nothing interesting to say. Many of the movie’s cast members who are supposed to have chemistry with each other don’t have any believable chemistry, resulting in too many awkwardly acted scenes. That’s mostly the fault of the director and anyone else who made the casting decisions.

In “The American Society of Magical Negroes,” Aren Mbado (played by Justice Smith) is a 27-year-old struggling artist who is based in Los Angeles. Aren’s specialty is making sculptures out of yarn. The movie’s first scene shows Aren at an art gallery exhibiting his work. At this gallery event, there are hardly any buyers. The spectators don’t seem to understand Aren’s art. It doesn’t help that constantly stammering Aren has trouble articulating to people what his art is all about.

Aren (who is African American) experiences a racial microaggression when a white male attendee (played by James Welch) mistakenly assumes that Aren is a waiter, not the artist whose art is on display. Gallery owner Andrea (played by Gillian Vigman) notices this insult and tells Aren, “If you don’t stick up for your art, I can’t do it for you.” Because the exhibit is a sales flop, Andrea also threatens to cancel Aren’s exhibit before the end of its scheduled run. Aren begs Andrea not to cancel because he says he spent more than $3,000 on yarn and can’t afford any more.

This isn’t how Aren (who is a graduate of the prestigious Rhode Island School of Design) thought his life would turn out to be. Aren is nearly broke, and he has no other job prospects. He doesn’t want to do work that doesn’t involve his artistic skills. Someone who is quietly observing Aren at the gallery is a bartender, who is also African American. The bartender will eventually introduce himself to Aren and reveal why he has been watching Aren.

After leaving the event, Aren goes to an outdoor ATM in a dark alley and sees he only has $17.31 in his bank account, which is below the minimum ATM withdrawal of $20. A young white woman named Lacey (played by Mia Ford) walks up to the ATM to make a transaction, but she’s having trouble using her ATM card. She asks Aren to help her. It turns into a very clumsily written scene of Lacey loudly accusing Aren of trying to steal her ATM card.

Just at that moment, two young white men named Brad (played by Eric Lutz) and Ryan (played by Kees DeVos) happen to be walking by and they come to the “rescue” of Lacey, as Aren vehemently denies that he was doing anything wrong. It’s supposed to be the movie’s way of showing a “Karen” incident, where a white woman wrongfully accuses a person of color (usually someone black) of a crime, and the white woman is automatically believed.

Just as it looks like there might be an altercation and police might be called, someone comes to Aren’s rescue: the bartender from the gallery event. He had been secretly following Aren and now is able to smooth-talk Lacey, Brad and Ryan, by showing them it was all a misunderstanding. As a way to placate them, this mysterious stranger starts talking about how great the neighborhood is and recommends that they go to his favorite barbecue restaurant nearby. Lacey, Brad and Ryan then amicably leave.

Aren thanks the stranger, who then reveals who he is and why he is there. He says his name is Roger (played by David Alan Grier), and he is a recruiter for the American Society of Magical Negroes, a secret group of black people whose purpose is to make white people comfortable and less likely to cause harm to black people. As Roger says to Aren, the “most dangerous animal” on Earth is “a white person who is uncomfortable,” especially around black people. Roger also says that “officially,” the society is a “client services industry.” But “unofficially, we’re saving the damn world.”

Roger tells Aren that Aren seems to have the qualities to be an ideal member of the American Society of Magical Negroes. Aren has to go through a vetting process first. Aren is very skeptical about what Roger is saying, until Roger teleports them to the headquarters of the American Society of Magical Negroes, which looks a lot like an African American version of the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry from the “Harry Potter” book/movie series.

In real life, the term “magical Negro” was invented by filmmaker Spike Lee as a way to describe a black character whose main purpose is to help and uplift the central white character in a story. This “magical Negro” usually has extraordinary abilities that are implemented to make the white protagonist’s life better. Some examples include the characters played by Will Smith in 2000’s “The Legend of Bagger Vance” and 2005’s “Hitch”; Whoopi Goldberg in 1990’s “Ghost”; and Michael Clarke Duncan in 1999’s “The Green Mile.”

At the American Society of Magical Negroes, the recruits are told that their white clients don’t know and aren’t supposed to know that they are clients. The recruits are taught what a “magical Negro” is supposed to do and are shown hologram-like examples, which are usually not-very-funny scenes of black men being subservient and fawning to white men. Oddly, and with no explanation, the movie has multiple scenes of black men grabbing white men’s crotches in these “magical Negro” scenes. There’s also a magical amulet that is used to gauge the level of “white tears” that a white person has, in order to determine how likely the white person will cause a racist incident that will make the white person look sympathetic.

The main teacher for these classes is a stern instructor named Gabbard (played by Aisha Hinds), while the society’s president is a wizard-like character named Dede Booker (played by Nicole Byer), who looks and acts like a low-rent fortune teller. Gabbard says of white people: “The happier they are, the safer we are.” Roger tells Aren: “White discomfort is your nemesis.” The number-one rule for the American Society of Magical Negroes is to keep the client happy.

One of the reasons why “The American Society of Magical Negroes” is so poorly written is that it never really shows why Aren is an ideal candidate for this group. The opening scene at the gallery is supposed to be the movie’s questionable “proof” that Aren would be perfect for this “magical Negro” job. But all the scene really shows is that Aren is a sad sack who’s terrible at selling his art. Nothing about Aren’s family background or social life is shown or explained, except a brief mention that his father is black and his mother is white.

The recruits for “The American Society of Magical Negroes” are told that if at any time, they show negative emotions to the white people who are assigned to them, then they will be expelled from the society and lose their magical powers. It’s supposed to mean that these expelled people will be more vulnerable to getting racist harm from white people. Dede tells the recruits that black people who aren’t part of the American Society of Magical Negroes will have a shorter life expectancy. It’s a faulty concept from the start, because racist harm can happen under a variety of circumstances, no matter how nice people are to the racists who want to harm them.

During a break from these training sessions, Aren goes to a coffee shop, where he accidently bumps into a woman in her 20s, and her coffee spills all over her clothes. They exchange banter in a “meet cute” conversation, where Aren tries to deny that he’s flirting with her, and they both try to act like they aren’t immediately attracted to each other, even though it’s obvious that they are. And then, Aren suddenly leaves without getting her name. You know where all of this is going, of course.

Aren needs the money that this “magical Negro” job is offering, so he agrees to be part of the tryout process, with Roger as Aren’s wryly observing mentor. One of these tests involves (not surprisingly) a white male cop named Officer Miller (played by Tim Baltz), who feels easily threatened in the presence of black men. It leads to some moronic, time-wasting scenes where Officer Miller needs help with masculine confidence, including being able to gain entrance into an exclusive, trendy nightclub.

When Aren passes the necessary tests, he becomes an official member of the Society of Magical Negroes. Aren is then assigned his first client: a design engineer named Jason (played by Drew Tarver) at a social media company called Meetbox, which is obviously a parody of Facebook. Aren magically gets a job at Meetbox as a graphic designer who happens to have his desk workspace right next to Jason’s desk workspace.

Almost everyone at Meetbox doesn’t seem like a real person but is portrayed in the movie as a stereotype. Jason is a tech dweeb with mediocre talent and almost no charisma, but the movie makes several un-subtle points that Jason is perceived as better than he really is, just because Jason is a white male. Jason has an attractive co-worker named Lizzie (played by An-Li Bogan), who just happens to be the same woman who met Aren at the coffee shop. More awkward conversations ensue.

The founder/CEO of Meetbox is an egotistical Brit named Mick (played by Rupert Friend), while the immediate supervisor of Lizzie, Jason and Aren is prickly Linda Masterson (played by Michaela Watkins), who cares more about being a sycophant to Mick than being a good boss. Meetbox gets embroiled in a racial scandal when people in Ghana get rejected from joining Meetbox because Meetbox’s facial recognition technology gives preference to white people. The movie never explains why only Ghana has this problem, as if black people only live in Ghana.

Several situations occur that show how Jason is unaware of how his white male privilege gives him advantages. Jason feels entitled to being thought of as superior to a more talented co-worker such as Lizzie, who wants the same job promotion that Jason wants. The movie shows that Linda is part of the problem too, since she uses coded terms such as Jason is a “better fit” than Lizzie to give an important presentation for an idea that came from Lizzie. Jason has no qualms about being unfairly chosen to lead this presentation.

Not surprisingly, Jason shows a romantic interest in Lizzie. Much of the movie is about a love triangle where “magical Negro” Aren isn’t supposed to let Jason know that he’s also interested in dating Lizzie. It all becomes so tiresome and tedious, because a lot of the movie’s dialogue and scenarios have no wit or charm.

Lizzie’s racial identity is not mentioned in the movie, except for Jason calling Lizzie “ethnic.” However, actress Bogan’s ethnicity in the movie’s production notes is described as Taiwanese/Irish. If “The American Society of Magical Negroes” really wanted to have more edge to its limp satire, it would’ve made the Lizzie character unambiguously white, in order to increase the racial tension between Aren and Jason.

It should come as no surprise that “The American Society of Magical Negroes” makes Jason a racist who doesn’t think that he’s racist. You can do a countdown to the “big racial confrontation” scene where someone goes on a rant about racism, as white people in the room get uncomfortable and try to deny racism. This scene falls flat, because Aren still ends up being sheepish and apologetic.

“The American Society of Magical Negroes” then goes off the rails into fantasy with teleporting scenes, as it seems to forget all about the movie’s original concept, and then takes a silly detour into wrapping up the conflicts over the love triangle. The performances in the movie aren’t terrible, but they aren’t impressive either, mainly because the writing and directing are so substandard. A “twist” at the end is an underwhelming commentary on sexist stereotypes. “The American Society of Magical Negroes” wants to tell some hard truths about racism, but the movie’s approach is woefully inadequate and lacking in credibility.

Focus Features released “The American Society of Magical Negroes” in U.S. cinemas on March 15, 2024.

Review: ‘The Bob’s Burgers Movie,’ starring the voices of Eugene Mirman, John Roberts, Kristen Schaal, Dan Mintz, H. Jon Benjamin, Kevin Kline and Zach Galifianakis

May 23, 2022

by Carla Hay

Linda Belcher (voiced by John Roberts), Louise Belcher (voiced by Kristen Schaal), Gene Belcher (voiced by Eugene Mirman), Tina Belcher (voiced by Dan Mintz) and Bob Belcher (voiced by H. Jon Benjamin) in “The Bob’s Burgers Movie” (Image courtesy of 20th Century Studios)

“The Bob’s Burgers Movie”

Directed by Loren Bouchard and Bernard Derriman

Culture Representation: Taking place in an unnamed beach city in a U.S. state that resembles New Jersey, the animated film “The Bob’s Burgers Movie” features a predominantly white cast of characters (with a few African Americans) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.

Culture Clash: The working-class Belcher family, which owns a fast-food restaurant called Bob’s Burgers, becomes involved in a murder mystery in the midst of having financial problems over a bank loan.

Culture Audience: Besides appealing to the obvious target audience of fans of “The Bob’s Burgers” TV series, “The Bob’s Burgers Movie” will appeal primarily to people interested in zany animated films that have comedy, drama and musical numbers that can be enjoyed by people of various generations.

A scene from “The Bob’s Burgers Movie” (Image courtesy of 20th Century Studios)

Whenever there’s a movie based on a long-running TV series, one of the biggest mistakes that can happen is when the filmmakers make the movie confusing to viewers who’ve never seen the TV series. Fortunately, “The Bob’s Burgers Movie” (which is based on the animated TV series “Bob’s Burgers”) does not fall into that trap. In fact, the movie is a great example of how to please existing fans, as well as how to win over newcomers to a franchise.

“Bob’s Burgers” (which premiered in 2011 and is televised in the U.S. on Fox) tells the ongoing story of the Belcher clan, a family of five whose patriarch owns and operate a small fast-food restaurant called Bob’s Burgers in an unnamed beach city in an unnamed U.S. state. (The show has dropped hints over the years that the state is probably New Jersey.) “Bob’s Burgers” creator showrunner Loren Bouchard wrote the screenplay for “The Bob’s Burgers Movie,” which Bouchard co-directed with Bernard Derriman.

Here are the five people in the Belcher family:

Bob Belcher (voiced by H. Jon Benjamin), the pessimistic Bob’s Burgers owner, who’s always worrying that the restaurant is on the brink of failing.
Linda Belcher (voiced by John Roberts), Bob’s eternally optimistic wife, helps manage Bob’s Burgers. Linda and Bob are both 44 years old.
Tina Belcher (voiced by Dan Mintz), Bob and Linda’s “boy crazy” eldest child, who’s 13 years old. Tina has a crush on a fellow teenager named Jimmy Pesto Jr. (also voiced by Benjamin), who is the son of the man who owns Jimmy Pesto’s Pizza, the biggest competitor to Bob’s Burgers.
Gene Belcher (voiced by Eugene Mirman), Bob and Linda’s mild-mannered middle child, who is 11 years old. Gene, who is a keyboardist, is preoccupied with his fledgling pop/rock band The Itty Bitty Ditty Committee.
Louise Belcher (voiced by Kristen Schaal), Bob and Linda’s feisty youngest child, who is 9 years old. Louise is fond of wearing a pink rabbit-ears hat, and she dislikes being perceived as a weak and cowardly kid.

“The Bob’s Burgers Movie” keeps things simple by not having too many of the characters that are in the “Bob’s Burgers” TV series take up a lot of screen time. (The character of Jimmy Pesto Sr. is not in the movie, because voice actor Jay Johnston has reportedly been dropped from the “Bob’s Burgers” franchise.) “The Bob’s Burgers Movie” could be a stand-alone story, with people never having to see the TV series to understand the movie. It’s a wise choice in the movie’s narrative, considering that many people seeing the “The Bob’s Burgers Movie” haven’t see any episodes of the TV series.

The essential plot of “The Bob’s Burgers Movie” intertwines two major problems experienced by the Belcher family: a bank loan deadline and a murder mystery. In the beginning of the movie, Bob’s Burgers is struggling to stay in business. Bob and Linda are denied an extension on a bank loan, which needs to be paid back in seven days. The day that Bob and Linda get this bad news, the street where Bob’s Burgers is located has a water main break because of old and leaky pipes underground. The breaking of the water main causes a massive sinkhole, right in front of the Bob’s Burgers entrance.

Bob’s Burgers temporarily uses a side door as its entrance and puts a sign out front saying that the restaurant is still open. But the damage to the business is devastating, since Bob’s Burgers gets no customers the day after the sinkhole has appeared. Bob starts to panic over how he’s going to pay back the loan, while Linda firmly believes that everything will eventually work out for the best. Linda thinks that all they have to do is make enough sales to get the money to pay back the loan.

Meanwhile, Louise (who is a student at Wagstaff School) is being harassed by a student bully named Chloe Barbash (voiced by Stephanie Beatriz), who makes fun of Louise, by calling her a “baby” for wearing a rabbit-ears hat. (The hat’s origin story is revealed in this movie.) This taunting then triggers Louise into attempting to prove to the other Wagstaff School students that Louise is no “baby” and that she’s braver than most children. Louise comes up with the idea to explore the sinkhole, and she enlists her siblings Gene and Tina to videorecord this expedition.

To the Belcher kids’ shock, Louise finds a skeleton of a man in the sinkhole. The police are called, and the sinkhole becomes a crime scene. A medical examination reveals that the man was murdered by being shot. The identity of the murdered man is revealed to be a local carnival worker named Danny D’Angelo, also known as Cotton Candy Dan. It’s also revealed that the murder took place six years ago. (The movie’s opening scene has a big hint that is connected to the murder.)

Calvin Fischoeder (voiced by Kevin Kline), the wealthy and pompous landlord for Bob’s Burgers, becomes the prime suspect in the murder, so he’s arrested. Also affected by this arrest are Calvin’s neurotic younger brother Felix Fischoeder (voiced by Zach Galifianakis) and Calvin’s talkative lawyer cousin Grover Fischoeder (voiced by David Wain), who is Calvin’s defense attorney. Bob fears that if Calvin is sent to prison for murder, Bob’s Burgers will lose its lease.

And so, there’s a “race against time” for the case to be solved, with the Belcher kids doing their own private investigation. A cranky cop named Sergeant Bosco (voiced by Gary Cole), who is a regular on the “Bob’s Burgers” TV series, is leading the police investigation. And, not surprisingly, he’s annoyed by anyone he thinks will be interfering in the case. Just like in the TV series, Sergeant Bosco can be a friend or a foe to the Belcher family in “The Bob’s Burgers Movie.”

Meanwhile, with the bank loan deadline approaching, Bob becoming increasingly desperate. And so, loyal Bob’s Burgers customer Teddy (voiced by Larry Murphy), who works as a contractor handyman and is Bob’s closest friend, comes up with the idea for Bob’s Burgers to set up a temporary food cart on the city’s beach boardwalk—even though Bob doesn’t have a permit to sell food on the boardwalk. Desperate times lead to desperate decisions, so they decide to take a chance and operate the food cart on the boardwalk anyway.

Teddy, who is a lonely and divorced bachelor, volunteers to be help operate the food cart by being the cook. Linda dresses up as a hamburger to entice customers. The movie has some amusing moments where Linda thinks that her selling skills are based on how sexy she thinks she looks in this ridiculous-looking burger costume. Bob predictably gets annoyed by Linda’s antics, and he becomes paranoid about getting busted for operating the food cart without a license.

“The Bob’s Burgers Movie” also has recurring comedic moments about each of the Belcher kids’ current obsessions. Tina has fantasies about asking Jimmy Jr. to be her boyfriend for the summer, so there are dreamlike romantic scenarios that play out in Tina’s imagination. Gene dreams of becoming a rock star, so there are musical numbers in the movie with The Itty Bitty Ditty Committee performing the music. Louise imagines herself as a popular kid with a “badass” reputation among her schoolmates, so there are scenes of Louise doing whatever she thinks it will take to have this courageous and heroic image.

“The Bob’s Burgers Movie” isn’t a mindless kiddie film, because it has plenty of jokes that adults will appreciate more than underage children will. These jokes have to do with social class and status issues that are presented in the story. Observant viewers will notice that all the grief that Louise goes through to change her image isn’t much different than all the trouble that adults go through to project a certain image, so that they can be considered “successful” by society.

The musical numbers in “The Bob’s Burger Movie” are very entertaining and amusing, particularly the performances of “Sunny Side Up Summer” and “Not That Evil.” Fortunately, this isn’t a movie where people break out into song every 10 minutes, because it would ruin the flow of the narrative. The mystery-solving part of the story gets a little convoluted and messy, but not too complicated.

“The Bob’s Burger Movie” continues the gender-swapping choices made in the “Bob’s Burgers” TV series casting, with men voicing some of the female characters, and women voicing some of the male characters. Benjamin (the voice of Bob) also voices the character of Ms. LaBonz, one of Louise’s teachers at Wagstaff School, while Roberts (the voice of Linda) is the also the voice of Jocelyn, one of Louise’s Wagstaff School classmates. As previously mentioned, Mintz is the voice of Tina.

There are also some celebrity cameos in gender-swapped roles. Jordan Peele continues as the voice of Fanny, Calvin’s much-younger singer girlfriend, who has a checkered past and a gold-digging agenda. Sarah Silverman and Laura Silverman are, respectively, the voices of Ollie and Andy, who are Jimmy Pesto Sr.’s twin sons.

In response to criticism that the “Bob’s Burgers” TV series cast white actors to voice African American characters, “The Bob’s Burgers Movie” has added some racial diversity to the cast. Nicole Byer (host of Netflix’s cooking competition “Nailed It!”) is the voice of Olsen Benner, an African American TV reporter, who has been voiced by Pamela Adlon in the “Bob’s Burger” TV series. Ashley Nicole Black (a writer for “Ted Lasso”) is now the voice of Harley, an African American girl who’s a classmate of Louise’s at Wagstaff School. Katie Crown was previously the voice of Harley.

Even with a lot of side characters, “The Bob’s Burgers Movie” remains focused on the Belcher family. The Belcher kids get a lot of screen time with the murder investigation, which is a more interesting and funnier part of the movie than the part of the movie about Bob, Linda and Teddy selling burgers on the boardwalk. And out of all the Belcher children, Louise is the one with the standout character arc. There’s not a bad actor in this entire cast.

“The Bob’s Burgers Movie” has wide appeal, but it’s not a movie that some people might enjoy if they’re looking for more dazzling visuals in an animated film. However, for viewers who care more about animated movies that have characters with memorable personalities, some snarky jokes, and an engaging story that’s easy to follow, then “The Bob Burgers Movie” delivers this type of entertainment in a lighthearted and playful way.

20th Century Studios will release “The Bob’s Burgers Movie” in U.S. cinemas on May 27, 2022.