Fruitvale station

The film fruit vale station was made in 2013 and was directed by Ryan Coogler. The film was based on the events which happened to Oscar Grant the third on the 31^st December and 1^st of January. The films was genre are drama, romance and social realism. It is a drama since it displays an honest story of human struggles. Such as the part when he loses his job and has to confess that to his wife. This links in with social realism. This film pin points a spot light on the young, black, lower/working class and illustrates what daily problems they have to deal with. There is also an element of the romance genre for example the plot revolves around Sophina and Oscar, mostly Oscar, making it in the Romance genre.

The Narrative to the film is non-linear. There is a flash back to when Oscar is in jail and his mother, Wanda, is visiting him. At first I believe it was a flash forward. I thought that Oscar had got caught by the police for dealing drugs but by the end of the film I learned that it was a flash back. I believe that this flash back fitted very well with the timing in the scene. The flash back came in when he was on the beach considering to deal the drugs. It gives the audience some information that he had spent time in jail before and was trying to turn his life around.

It represents the young, black man as the struggler. The struggler usually lives for today and makes very few plans for tomorrow. Often seen as the victims, losers and disorganised people with few recourses apart from their own physical skills. They consume heavy alcohol and seek visual impact or physical sensation for example New Year’s Eve. The main character, Oscar, fits this struggler role very well. He recently lost his job therefore making him the loser. He lost it because he was late therefore being disorganised. He finds escapism in the physical sensation of the New Year’s Eve trip. Most of the young black males are represented in this way. All of his Oscars friends have low paid jobs or no jobs at all and they result to drugs to escape the monotonous cycle of their life. I believe it represents the white middle aged man as the succeeder.  The scene where Oscar is waiting outside the shop with white man on the New Year’s Eve night. The white man looks a lot well dressed and tells Oscar about how he stole a ring for the engagement ring and that he started up a web design business. The white man started at the bottom, being a credit card fraudster. Then working his way up to becoming the manager of the web designer company.