How's `Hancock' stack up among movie twists?

A Will Smith movie packs in millions of people over Fourth of July weekend. No surprises there.

Yet Smith's "Hancock," the tale of an anti-social boozer who happens to be a superhero, comes with an abrupt plot twist, one that has divided critics and the moviegoing public in the real world (Critics and everyone else can't agree. Now there's a real surprise).

For those who have yet to see "Hancock," we won't give the secret away, but it has something to do with why Charlize Theron's soccer-mom-style character doesn't want Smith's surly superhero anywhere near her family.

Critics generally thought the turn the movie takes halfway through was a cheat, spoiling what had been a promising idea that was a fresh twist on the superhero genre in its own right.

The people who turned "Hancock" into an instant blockbuster beg to differ to the sum of $185 million worldwide at the box office in just a few days.

NVDL: I watched Hancock on Saturday night. I think the plot twist is definitely something that is going to divide movie audiences. I wonder - if it was an opposite scenario, say a black couple, with a white superhero doing the dirty...I wonder how y'all would feel about that? Others would say race is irrelevant. Perhaps it should be, but the reaction so far shows otherwise.

Blackman is an idiot – thank God most black men aren’t

The word coloured was created by a government who couldn’t define certain people

Deputy Chief Reporter Francois Rank finds the term offensive, but he is not ashamed of his mixed descent

THERE’S that bleeding word again. Coloured ! When Blackman Ngoro (what an awesome name) wrote that inane article on his web site, I’ll be honest it didn’t really bother me.

I just thought it was pretty funny that a black man named Blackman would be stupid enough to write an article about race. I mean come on, the potential for double meaning here is limitless.

But then again Blackman is from Zimbabawe, so he is in the unique position of having coloured people living within his country’s borders.

Actually so do Americans. Wait, no, those people are black. Semantics is an interesting thing, isn’t it?

It’s amazing how the same word can have two completely different meanings – both linked to race in this case, mind you.

In America if you are of mixed descent and one of your parents is what they call black or what we call coloured , you are black or what they used to call coloured.

Here if one of your parents is black and one isn’t, you are what we call coloured and not what we call black but definitely what they call black.

The point I am trying to make is that the terms that Blackman used in his article are in the long run simply a construct.

Blackman, I am sure he won’t mind me calling him that. I mean that’s who he is or should that be what he is after all?

Constructs: In this country the word coloured was created to divide and that is what it is still doing today.

I am coloured , so I have been told, but I have always regarded myself as black.
I date a white woman who I might end up marrying one day.

Sometimes when we talk about our collective future she asks me what our children would be. You know white or coloured . Now it’s possible that our kids could come out white as the driven snow with beautiful light eyes but they won’t be white, I’m afraid they’ll be coloured .

Stupid, isn’t it?
But that is how the construct works.

The word was created by a government who couldn’t define a certain group of people, so decided to lump them all together and call them “Kleurling”.
The Oxford Dictionary describes the term “ coloured ” as “wholly or partly of non white descent (now usually offensive except in SA use) SA: of mixed ethnic origin”.

It’s the offensive part I want to deal with. I for one find it offensive.
Not because I am ashamed of my mixed descent.
Although I don’t know how mixed it is as both my parents are the same ethnicity.

No, I find it offensive because the word itself was something someone came up with because they could not think of anything better.
Now I know some scholar is probably going to blow me out of the water with a diatribe about the Geneology of my people, but I don’t care.

I am proud of my people but please do not label me – especially because you find that I am inconvenient.

Blackman you’re an idiot, thank God most black men are not.
The next time my girlfriend asks me what our children will be, I know exactly what I’ll tell her: “Beautiful. They’ll be beautiful.”

Above article by Francois Rank, courtesy Weekend Post.

NVDL: I was only aware that the term was unique to SA when I was outside of SA. I appreciate and can understand that some people don’t like the term ‘coloured’. There are probably a lot of white people in SA who have met people who call themselves ‘coloured’ – especially in the Cape – and I worked with many – and who also seemed to identify and celebrate this identity in a positive way. It’s not that far fetched either to think that some people of mixed race will want to see themselves as coloured, and not black, or coloured and not white (South Africans) - essentially gravitating towards or away an aspect of their ethnicity. I can imagine it’s a difficult situation for all, but I suppose it starts with being clear to others how you define yourself when one’s name no longer provides an indication.

White people are very quick to label each other, if not by language then ancestry. So labeling is natural and when not clear, mistakes probably are easily made. I see it as in the form of neglectful casual lazy convenience and indifference; I’m not sure it’s conventionally meant to be demeaning even if it seems that way, but I’m sure there are frequent exceptions.

For me I’ve been a rooinek, Dutchman, boer etc. I’m not sure if I am any, I’m probably all and neither. Essentially I see myself as South African, and when the shit hits the fan, I see myself as 2nd gen. Dutch. Thus I gravitate away from the British 25% that is in my blood, and the Afrikaans 25%, and towards the 50% Dutch. I’m not sure whether it matters, or if it should matter, but I think in terms of one’s own identity it’s important. And in that way it is probably as much my (your) responsibility to communicate who I am (you are) as it is someone else’s to be sensitive to that definition. But I think expecting the world to be fully aware of each of our private and personal sensitivities is expecting a lot from the world.