The Tenants directed by Danny Green, English, 2006, color, 97
minutes.
By Donald H. Harrison
SAN DIEGO, Calif.— This adaptation of a book by Bernard
Malamud is the story of two writers, one a Jew, the other a Black. For
years novelist Harry Lesser (Dylan McDermott) has lived and worked alone in a
Brooklyn tenement building, the last holdout against Mr. Levenspiel (Seymour
Cassel), the landlord, who constantly pleads for Lesser to move so
he can at last sell the building to a developer. His reclusive life is
interrupted, however, when an aspiring Black writer Willie Spearmint (Snoop Dogg)
decides to create a writing nook illegally in a nearby apartment.
Despite Spearmint's continuous foul-mouthing of the Jews—in particular not
using "Jew" properly as a noun, but as a derogatory adjective—he and
Lesser become social acquaintances. However, this particular relationship can
never become a friendship; Spearmint has too much anger against Whites, and
Lesser has too little insight, too little interest, or too little courage, even
after reading Spearmint's manuscript, to engage the African-American in a
heart-to-heart discussion about his deeply passionate views. Instead, the
only comments Spearmint can drag from Lesser about his manuscript are tentative,
vague, critiques of the form of the novel. Frustrated, and enraged,
Spearmint verbally lashes out.
Spearmint also fails to respond to Lesser's deeply-felt pain. When Lesser
has had enough of Spearmint's anti-Semitic diatribes, he tells Spearmint,
"cut out that Jew stuff," but the plea has little effect. When Lesser
has a chance meeting with Irene at an art museum, he cautions his co-religionist
to get away from Spearmint, advice she ignores. Thereafter, his concern
for her grows into infatuation and then—or so he thinks—love. But as
we watch this relationship develop, we are reminded of Lesser's and Irene's
first meeting, when she asked the shy, serious, novelist what he writes
about. "Love," he responds. "What do you know about
love?" she challenges. As it turns out, this was a very perceptive
question.
Irene's and Lesser's relationship develops in an unorthodox way. Mary
(Nikki Crawford), a beautiful Black woman whom Lesser had met at a social
gathering at his apartment, boldly invites him at another party in the
neighborhood to go next door with her to have sex—an invitation he accepts.
Their departure is noticed by Mary's boyfriend Sam (Aldis Hodge), who, on their
return, is mad enough to kill him. Spearmint and the other party-goers,
all of whom are Black except for Irene, angrily surround Lesser.
Spearmint calls Lesser a volley of foul names, challenging him to answer in
kind. Although words are Lesser's forté, he cannot compete in the "dissing"
contest, where words are valued not for their nuances, but for their
viciousness. And though he is again subjected to anti-Semitic slurs,
Lesser declines to answer in kind. Whether for safety in such a crowd, or
out of genuine distaste for racist slurs, Lesser holds his tongue, never
descending to the level of racist name-calling. Eventually, Irene
intervenes, asking to leave. Spearmint rudely orders her to leave without
him—confirming in Lesser's mind that Spearmint has no real regard for his
Jewish girlfriend, that she is just a possession to be paraded in front of his
Black friends.
The next day, Spearmint is back at Lesser's apartment, acting as if their
relationship is unchanged. Rather than being apologetic for the scene the
night before, he tells Lesser that he has done him a favor. If he hadn't
turned the situation into one of words, he explains, there would have been
physical violence. In essence, by humiliating Lesser to salve the feelings
of Sam and his friends, he had prevented physical violence. Lesser
responded by thanking him. As Lesser had been protecting Spearmint from
the landlord (a Jew who, unlike Lesser, routinely uses racist words to describe
Blacks), the score, you might say, has been evened.
However, the scene has been set for the ultimate rivalry, the competition over
Irene, with Lesser attending a play in which she is performing, later seducing
her, and eventually surprising her, and DVD watchers, by asking her to marry
him. Furthermore, he wants her to tell Spearmint about their relationship,
or allow him to do so, but she pleads for time. It is clear to everyone,
except perhaps Lesser, that Spearmint will react violently to the news.
What is Lesser's motivation? Does he really love Irene, or does he just
want to show up Spearmint?
How the story ends is not to be told here.
What we can ask ourselves, however, is to what degree is this story a metaphor
for the relationship between Jews and Blacks? The two writers, ostensibly,
have common interests, as indeed the two minority groups have common
interests. The two groups are willing to have intercourse with each other,
both in the sexual and the intellectual sense of the word, but to a large degree
they are unwilling to address each other's issues, either dismissing or
minimizing them.
It's important to realize that Malamud wrote the book on which this movie is
based back in the 1970s, at a time when Blacks and Jews were becoming
increasingly disillusioned with each other, notwithstanding their cooperation in
the previous decade in the Civil Rights movement.
However, this is not just a "period" piece. Many issues between Blacks
and Jews continue to be abrasives some 30 years after Malamud wrote the
book. The well-acted movie is a reminder to us that to live and let live
is not merely a formula for benign neglect, but an injunction for us to care
about our fellow man—whether they be members of our group, or the
"other."
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