Black Like Me

Black Like Me

Black Like Me, a 1964 film based on the book by John Howard Griffin and also based on a true story, tells the story of a white man who takes treatments that darkens the pigment of his skin and travels to the South. The time period of this movie is a time in which racism is at its peak. Blacks and whites are segregated, Jim Crow laws are in effect, and white supremacy is at a high. African Americans are hated and persecuted against often. They are victims of police brutality and unfair treatment, simply because of their skin color.

John Horton, a resident of Texas, temporarily becomes an African American for six months, and throughout these six months he learns, firsthand, how it was to be Black in the late 1950s, early 1960s. Although he is white, Horton feels angry at the many white men he meets on his trek to the South who talk down upon African Americans.

As he hitchhikes through the southern hemisphere, he encounters man people, black, white, male and female. One of the first African Americans he meets is also one of the first friends he makes on this trip, Burt Wilson. Wilson is a shoe shine man and upon learning that Horton is new to the �sleepy South’ he teaches him how to �act right.’ Teaching Horton how to �act right’ helps him fit in with the other African Americans he meets and also lets him know how to act around whites to ensure that he is safe.

This part of the movie is very comparable to the time period of the South in which Emmett Till was alive. When Till left Chicago to visit relatives in Mississippi, his mother reminded him that he also need to act right, and by acting right that meant saying �yes sir’ or �no ma’am’ to the whites and only speaking when spoken to. This movie is not far from reality because the encounter like the one Horton experienced with the shoeshine man really happened in the past.

In many instances, Horton is harassed and persecuted by whites for no apparent reason. In one case, Horton is sitting on a bench in a park, and happens to be sitting by a white woman. While he is sitting there, a white man walks by and tells him “You’d better find another place to sit.” This scene in the movie can be compared to the famous Rosa Parks incident in which a white man tells her to move to the back of the bus after she is seated in the front, which is mainly for white passengers.

In the South