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[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

Ahh, this explains it. You don't know what you're talking about, but still have very clear opinions.

The musician is an uber educated doctor (as in PhD) who is quite bothered by the white guy's loutish behavior. He often expresses the view that the white's behavior/speech etc. is unacceptable coming from his driver. The level of this displeasure is limited in the movie, but if we got more of it, it might be harder to like the doctor (again that is the musician). Also, a flaw in the movie (which cannot possibly have been the best movie, as it has flaws) is that the doctor
has some peculiar aspects that are not explained. Example: he sits on a throne when greeting visitors. Why? Who knows. He also seems to have no interaction with anyone other than his man servant. He might be a very weird person is he were more the focus.

Now, it is supposed to be "based upon a true story." One could have written the story to make him less unlikable and strange. But then, see, that "true story" stuff would go away.

The white guy is lead because the back story is his family. The doctor (again this is the musician) has no apparent family, so the equivalent scenes would have been him sitting on a throne ordering his butler around.

Again, making the movie from the doctor's (Ty- this is the musician) POV might result in a less desirable movie because of who the doctor seems to have been. I guess my question was how can people just reject the movie based on who is lead, when it seems to be possibly a clear choice for story purpose. But maybe you've answered the question? Ignorance combined with a lack of story telling ability?

As TM says, the choice of perspective, of putting the white character at the center and making the black character peripheral to him is a choice. One could make movies about black men, but Hollywood doesn't do that so much, Black Panther excepted.