According to a list of the 50 Most Racist Movies of all time, Breakfast at Tiffany’s is the #1 mofo, Planet of the Apes is the runner-up, and Soul Man is in third place. I don’t want to dispute or disparage, but there’s above-board racism (i.e., the kind that Tarantino practices) and subterranean racism, which is the kind that needs to be pointed out and admonished. There are many films on this list that qualify as above-board and are therefore not so bad.
Anyway, White Chicks is sixth, Scarface ranks 14th, Dangerous Minds is 17th and…wait, Bottle Rocket is 49th? Because of Inez, the non-English-speaking cleaning girl whom Luke Wilson fell in love with? That seems like a huge stretch.
There’s a third kind of racism, of course — the journalistic kind resulting from the use of plain language to describe offensive appearances or behavior. If a woman has taken her two year-old daughter to a showing of Hostel 2 and you mention that she’s Hispanic, you’re a racist. But if you mention that a female judge who’s been nominated to the Supreme Court is of Hispanic descent, nobody will say anything. If you write that there’s a Swedish or Norweigan guy living upstairs who throws noisy foot-stomping parties that last until 3 or 4 in the morning, nobody says boo. But if you mention that he’s Hispanic, you’re a racist. HE p.c. haters know all about this system.