Toe-tapping screen musical: The Colour Purple's sisterhood with (centre) Danielle Brooks. Photo / Supplied
Toe-tapping screen musical: The Colour Purple's sisterhood with (centre) Danielle Brooks. Photo / Supplied
I‘m ashamed to admit I’ve still not seen the 1985 film The Color Purple, Steven Spielberg’s adaptation of Alice Walker’s gruelling tale of intergenerational abuse in the American south. It was nominated for 11 Oscars – including nods for Whoopi Goldberg and Oprah Winfrey – and won none. But trustme when I say that this update, a toe-tapping screen musical of the Broadway show, which is also produced by Winfrey and Spielberg, stands on its own merits. It’s a heartfelt, super stylish and glorious experience brimming with stunning performances from a cast of rising stars.
In 1900s Georgia, close sisters Celie and Nettie are separated when Celie is forced into a startlingly cruel marriage to the violent, desperate Mister (a terrific Colman Domingo).
In the following years, Celie (Fantasia Barrino) meets various women who empower her to keep her head up. Each of these women, too, has her own cross to bear.
Barrino is among some of the cast reviving their stage roles from the Broadway productions. But far from feeling like just another stage musical plonked onto the big screen, with Ghanaian polymath Blitz Bazawule directing, it’s a cinematic feast.
He takes the opportunity provided by film to portray various moments of magical realism, such as Celie’s flights of fancy whenever she’s trying to escape the trauma inflicted on her.
The cast of talented singers includes The Little Mermaid star Halle Bailey, Danielle Brooks (who, like Barrino, is reprising her Broadway role as Sofia, the part Winfrey played) plus standout Taraji P Henson (Empire) who stuns as seductive nightclub singer, Shug Avery.
There has been criticism that this film, like its 1985 forebear, doesn’t sufficiently acknowledge the lesbian relationship at the centre of Walker’s novel – here, it’s inferred but certainly diluted.
But the whole film feels so smooth and effortlessly exuberant, navigating difficult tonal shifts between musical numbers in which plucky, inspirational women sing “Hell, no!” to scenes of menace and domestic violence.
