PoC Studios
A Snowy Day in Oakland
A Snowy Day in Oakland
A Snowy Day in Oakland is a fairytale set in a predominantly Black neighborhood. However, it’s not “once upon a time” but happening now in a community threatened from many sides. A Snowy Day’s computer-generated street scenes enhance the sense of watching a storybook unfold.
And it’s also a comedy, a funnier comedy than most Hollywood product thanks to snappy dialogue by writer-director Kim Bass (“Sister, Sister,” “In Living Color”). Nicole Ari Parker stars as Latrice Monroe, a psychotherapist who leaves her prosperous San Francisco practice (and her aging Valley Girl clients) to set up shop across the bay in the place where she was born. When she was 11, her father got a good job on the east coast and the family moved on up—she graduated Yale with Ph.D. She kept a childhood memory in the form of an Oakland snow globe, a nagging reminder of what was lost because of all that she gained.
Bass may have gotten the snow globe from Citizen Kane, but he has a particular point to make about the Black upper middle class. They are often accused of severing ties with their roots. Latrice reverses course, whether consciously or not at first. The trigger for her move to Oakland wasn’t social engagement but an argument with her upper class white boyfriend, and she decided to storm out of her comfortable life, perhaps neglecting the advice she gives her clients—“By examining yourself, you understand why you’re doing what you’re doing.”
Her new neighbors are wary. The squabbling, divorced couple who own the barber shop-community hub, the fashion boutique owner and the Cuban American father-and-daughter bodega operators wonder what she’s up to. As the boisterous letter carrier Jeanette puts it, “Black people don’t talk about their problems. They keep it deep down inside. It’s between us and God.” Before long, Jeanette is on Latrice’s couch, talking, as Latrice becomes aware of the positive role she can play in the community.
As for God, the storefront church preacher (photo of Martin Luther King Jr. on his desk) understands that Latrice can complement, not compete with, the solace he provides. And psychotherapy has nothing to match the hand-clapping music at his Sunday service!
Every fairytale has an ogre. A Snowy Day in Oakland has Mr. King, a rapacious Black capitalist, everyone’s landlord and eager evict them all. He’s got a deal with white urban developers who plan to level the whole block to build condos and parking ramps. And there is also the cop, lacking cultural understanding, ready to draw and fire on the ineptly hustling local rapper with an unfortunate name, Glock-9. Many fairytales have a fairy godmother and in A Snowy Day, it comes from a surprising corner.
A good fairytale should also have a moral and A Snowy Day’s is expressed by Latrice when she finally explains her move to Oakland. “By helping others, you help yourself.”
Screening at Marcus Southgate Cinema, Marcus South Shore Cinema, Marcus Menomonee Falls Cinema and Marcus Renaissance Cinema.
