I have a tendency to get nervous when writing about a historical film that tackles such an important subject as racism and segregation because I cannot come to the subject with any personal experiences and history. As a white man from Montana in the 1980s, I never saw that side of life, and thus when I see films that depict it, I struggle with understanding the mindset of the time. One thing that helps me, at least a bit, is the two years I spent living in Mississippi and Louisiana, where I saw the residuals of it were still there, even if most people tried to pretend it wasn’t. On top of my inexperience with the subject, I have problems with films that exaggerate or outright change the history to get a message across that wouldn’t have been there at the time the film takes place. Inserting segregation into a narrative when it didn’t actually exist in that place at that time frustrates me as a viewer because I feel that there should be a better way to get the point across than to invent drama where it didn’t actually exist.
With all of that in mind, I went into this viewing of Hidden Figures with a little bit of trepidation. I knew that when I first saw this film, I liked it quite a bit, but I also learned a lot about the real history in the eight years since; history that we were never taught when studying the space race in school. What I discovered is that this film is not really about racism or sexism in Virginia in the 1960s. While those things were definitely a big part of the narrative in the film, what the film is really about is the support system behind the key players that helped them overcome the obstacles in their way and be all that they could be. It required a lot of determination on their parts, too, but each of the three main women had some sort of support system behind them that they couldn’t have made it without.
The film follows the lives of three African American women, all of whom work for NASA in Virginia during the early days of the space race. The first is Katherine Goble (Taraji P. Henson), a widow with children at home who was recognized as a child prodigy for the genius that she was and was allowed to graduate high school at 14 and college by 18. She, alongside Mary Jackson (Janelle Monáe) and Dorothy Vaughan (Octavia Spencer), are employed as ‘computers,’ crunching numbers for NASA without any idea of what specifically those numbers go to. Mary has a desire to become a NASA engineer but faces the roadblock of a specific degree that is required but only taught in an all-white school. Dorothy is the unofficial supervisor of the all-black women’s computing group, wanting the official title and pay for the job that she is already doing but keeps being told by her White supervisor, Vivian Mitchell (Kirsten Dunst), that she should be grateful to even have a job here.
Katherine is promoted to assist Al Harrison’s (Kevin Costner) Space Task Group, given her skills in analytic geometry, making her the first Black woman on the team. This new assignment comes with its own share of challenges, starting with a team that is comprised mostly of white men who don’t know what to think about this new co-worker. Soon there is a coffee pot in place labeled “colored only” and the nearest bathroom she can utilize is more than a mile away round trip, which she must traverse on foot because any other method of transportation around the facilities is segregated to white people only. On top of that, her first assignment is to double-check all of the computations made by head engineer Paul Stafford (Jim Parsons), a proud man who resents having his work verified by someone else, let alone a Black woman. Tensions between these two will only rise as it becomes clear that Katherine is the smartest one in the room, eclipsing Paul, himself.
Meanwhile, Mary Jackson has her own battles to face. She wants to be an engineer for NASA but feels that her minority status and gender prevent her from following that dream. She gets a boost from a co-worker, engineer Karl Zielinski (Olek Krupa), who encourages her to find a way, pointing out that he, himself, is a Polish Jew who not that long ago was also persecuted for his race. The most important thing she has going for her, though, is her husband who stands by her even as she has to work long hours at NASA and take night classes afterwards to pursue the degree needed to be an engineer in the program.
The most interesting story of the three, though, is that of Dorothy Vaughn who continues to play the role of supervisor even without the title. She faces the very real possibility of her division being obsolete when a new IDM computer system is brought into NASA. Not only does she find a way to learn how to communicate with and program the computer, she makes sure to train all of the women working under her to do the same, making them a valuable asset when their old positions are downsized. She is not only looking out for her own job but that of all the other Black women working for her, eventually being allowed to expand that to training the White women, too. It’s this kind of support system that helps all of these women during a time when so much was against them.
Not all of the hardships depicted here are factual for the timeframe of this film. But that doesn’t really matter. This is a film about supporting each other and succeeding because of that support. We see so much of that throughout the film that it becomes impossible to miss this point. The battle isn’t always between the White people and the Black people, either. We see this in the first interaction between Katherine and Jim Johnson (Mahershala Ali), the man she would eventually marry. He has a hard time, at first, understanding a woman like Katherine and what drives her to want to succeed in a white man’s world. For his part, he comes to accept it, and the two would be married and stay together for sixty years. We also see this conflict with Mary and her husband, who is having to play the domestic role more than an average father would have been used to in the 1960s. There is no way that Mary could have done all that she did without his support, though, and their scenes together emphasize that, too.
Dorothy is the type of woman who helps everyone around her to succeed. She was taught mechanics by her father and is making sure that her children are being taught to be self-sufficient, too. So often in movies about this era, we see the impoverished minorities living just above the poverty line, but this film makes a point to show us that, while there is inequality and segregation, they are still in good-paying jobs for the time and are doing alright for themselves.
Another thing this film is about is respect. There are subtle and unsubtle ways this is portrayed. Al Harrison is a no-nonsense type of boss, but he doesn’t really see what is really going on right in front of him until it hits him square in the face; his focus is too much on the program to notice that. All this comes crashing right into his face when he gets upset over the abnormally long bathroom breaks Katherine is taking. This scene, Taraji’s finest in the film, points out to him the disparagement she is facing being there and that something as simple as a bathroom break requires her to hoof it over a mile, rain or shine. Cut to Harrison with a sledgehammer knocking down the sign designating the color’s only bathroom and proclaiming NASA to be integrated. He understands the value of being a team, working together and not being divided.
Vivian spends most of the picture being cold and dismissive of Dorothy, not realizing just how nasty she is actually being until it is spelled out to her. This kind of casual dismissiveness can be seen in all of their early interactions including calling Dorothy by her first name instead of the more polite and respectful Mrs. Vaughan. Their final interaction when Vivian brings her the notification of her promotion to supervisor shows that she has been thinking about how she has acted and is trying to do better. Likewise, there is a final moment between Katherine and Paul where he hands her a cup of coffee. It’s a simple gesture, and no great emphasis is placed on it, but it speaks a lot for their evolving working relationship.
This is a tremendous film that managed to tell a lot in such a short period of time. We learn a lot about the space race and what went into figuring out how to safely get those astronauts into space and back home safely. As much as that is interesting, it takes a backseat to the personal stories of Katherine, Mary, and Dorothy and the things they did to not only further the space race but lift each other up and succeed in life. This is a story that we were not taught in history class, and had it not been for the magnificent book by Margot Lee Shetterly, and this film that came out of that, it probably would still be a forgotten piece of American history. We need to not forget these kinds of stories because they enlighten our understanding of the absolute bravery of the women who were there at the time. We all know who John Glenn was, the man who was launched into space and became the first American in orbit. But not all of us know who Katherine Goble was and what role she played in getting him up there and back safely. A film like Hidden Figures, dramatic license and all, can help us learn this little bit of history that had such a huge impact on all our lives.
Academy Award Nominations:
Best Picture: Donna Gigliotti, Peter Chernin, Jenno Topping, Pharrell Williams, and Theodore Melfi
Best Supporting Actress: Octavia Spencer
Best Adapted Screenplay: Allison Schroeder and Theodore Melfi
____________________________________________________
Release Date: December 10, 2016
Running Time: 127 Minutes
Rated PG
Starring: Taraji P. Henson, Octavia Spencer, Janelle Monáe, Kevin Costner, Kirsten Dunst, Jim Parsons, Mahershala Ali, Aldis Hodge, and Glen Powell
Directed By: Theodore Melfi
Comments
Post a Comment