We don’t get to see how Ezra or Amira cross the yawning racial gap that the movie focuses on. Netflix – Courtesy
By Mira Fox
January 26, 2023
Are Jews really white? It’s a question that has dominated conversations since the Black Lives Matters protests of 2020. Jews often present as white, and hold economic privilege, yet the recent uptick of antisemitic incidents, whether Kanye West’s months-long outburst or attacks on Hasidic Jews on Brooklyn streets, shows that it’s not quite so simple.
You People, A new comedy rom-com featuring Jonah Hill, Kenya Barris and slapstick humor tweaks the big conversation a bit. It assumes that Jews must be white. Instead, it asks if Jews are the worst kind.
It is important to draw heavily from Guess Who’s Coming to DinnerThe new film follows an interracial married couple who try to make their families happy. Ezra Hill is a NJB, who works in finance. But his true passion is his hip-hop podcast, which he co-hosts with Mo, a queer Black woman. He falls for Amira (Lauren London), an African fashion designer. The two share a love for street style and they fall in love.
But we don’t actually see much of Ezra and Amira’s love story, which is neatly packaged into a montage early on. Instead, we’re focused on their parents. There’s Akbar, played by Eddie Murphy, Amira’s dad and a Nation of Islam convert; and Shelley, a frenetic Julia Louis-Dreyfus as Ezra’s wealthy, tactless mother.
While I’m not convinced that slapstick humor is the best way to get at an issue as delicate as Black-Jewish race relations, comedy can often be a useful tool to get at deeper truths. Shelley’s attempts to make casual conversations about police brutality with Amira, for example, are a familiar kind of cringe. She’s trying, yes, but for all the wrong reasons; she thinks that befriending a Black woman will prove that she’s the right kind of wealthy white woman. “I’m going to have Black grandbabies!” she proclaims. “We’re a family of color — we are the future now!”
The Washington Post So called You People a “master class in wedge issues and our shared humanity.” Yet we never see any characters share their humanity; most of them are so caricatured they’re hardly human at all.
In one scene, leaning into the worst stereotypes about Black fatherhood, Amira’s uncle — a career criminal — talks about getting arrested for stalking his “baby mama” in an attempt to get his child support payments lowered. There’s a barbershop full of gang members. Akbar talks a lot about his hatred of white people.
Most of the Black characters are given at least some character development. Meanwhile, the movie’s Jews are flat stereotypes — wealthy, neurotic, painfully uncool and often blithely racist. We know Ezra’s family is Jewish thanks to an early scene at Yom Kippur services, where numerous family friends make extremely off-color comments. A doctor attempts to propose Ezra by asking him to go to the synagogue’s bathroom. Those Jews, they’re just so gross, right?
Past that scene-setting opening, however, there’s little Jewish about Ezra’s family. They’re basically just exaggerated versions of wealthy, liberal white people. Except that they are constantly reminded, often clumsily and inexplicably, that they are Jewish. “I need you to dig deep down into that little Jewish body of yours,” Ezra’s fellow podcaster tells him while giving him advice, in case you’d forgotten he was Jewish. Who said that?
It almost feels like it’s a miracle. You People is trying to draw a clear connection between Ezra’s parents’ religion and their boorish behavior; they’re not just white, they’re even worse — they’re Jewish. This movie supports some of the most dangerous antisemitic conspiracy theories that have been in the news recently. When Amira and Ezra’s families meet over dinner, Akbar says he idolizes Louis Farrakhan. “I’m familiar with what he has said about the Jews,” Shelley replies, uncomfortable.
The dinner escalates into a screaming match in which Amira’s parents accuse Ezra’s family of comparing the Holocaust to slavery and proceed to say the Holocaust wasn’t so bad since Jews are so wealthy now — wealth, Akbar says, inherited from controlling the slave trade. This is a conspiracy theory that’s growing in strength, yet the movie does nothing to debunk it — Ezra’s parents don’t even protest.
If anything, the Jews come across so badly — prurient, fetishistic, gauche, with no actual history or beliefs beyond wealth — that it’s easy to believe that the slave trade conspiracy is true and they simply don’t want to contend with the sordid origins of their wealth. And if viewers aren’t already familiar with Farrakhan’s open antisemitism, or the fact that the Nation of Islam is a designated hate group, it’s easy to brush off Shelley’s concerns as a white woman unable to acknowledge her privilege. Especially since Ezra says Farrakhan “tells it like it’s gotta be told.”
The last 20 minutes of the 2-hour movie are the most interesting. You People The abrupt course correction is made and the characters begin to aim for a happy conclusion. This is a romcom. We are treated to a series of monologues, which offer some very real, though not so subtle, insights into American racism. There is also a lot more on how people should not be judged based upon their looks. Shelley and Akbar make peace and apologize to their children.
But it’s hard to buy their happily ever after. “You said that Black people and white people could never be cool, and I think you’re right,” Ezra tells a friend near the end of the movie. After watching an hour and a half of Jewish-Black clashes, it’s easier to believe Amira and Ezra are doomed than to believe in their love story.
