Despite landmark films such as Guess Who's Coming To Dinner and Jungle Fever, memorable cinematic interracial romances have been too few and far between. While it may not go down in film history, Something New, a hybrid of romance, comedy and social commentary, bravely interrogates the unspoken taboos of black and white dating. Its opinion is no gray matter -- the film ultimately advocates interracial relationships wholeheartedly.
Kenya (Sanaa Lathan), a successful workaholic up for partner at her law firm, has her doubts. Unlucky in love, she desires what her girlfriend calls "the IBM" or "Ideal Black Man" -- employed, no kids, good teeth, college educated and not crazy.
The problem is the ideal man for her isn't black. He is white. In fact, he is a blond-haired, blue-eyed tree-hugger named Brian (Simon Baker) who landscapes her backyard. Although she tells him that she "prefers black men," Kenya soon finds herself inviting him in for take-out, reluctantly accepting his invitation to go hiking and kissing him in the rain.
Something New courageously charts the journey of Kenya's revelation that love can, indeed, transcend racial differences. The film admirably marries penetrating considerations of prejudice, stereotypes and fear with tender comedy.
Something New, however, is not glitch-free. The film heavy-handedly exhausts metaphors of Kenya's sexual and personal awakening. As a landscape artist, Brian transforms her scraggly wasteland of a backyard into an ambrosial paradise (or, as he tells her, "I take a hard earth and make things bloom").
Although Brian may be high on sensuality, his character seems low on development compared with Kenya's -- Lathan winningly portrays a woman whose head and heart are at odds. While Brian sees no major obstacles to their romance (to him, "women are women"), Kenya's brother (Donald Faison) raises his voice and his eyebrows. He demands to know if she's been "sneaking off to the O.C." or "sleeping with the enemy." Soon, Kenya begins to ask herself the same thing.
Although Kenya's garden blooms with bougainvillea and roses, the film does not shy away from thorny issues. It is this quality, not necessarily the acting or predictable plot, which makes Something New something worth seeing.
The film's most powerful scene occurs in a grocery store where, amongst apples and avocados, Kenya and Brian passionately debate whether a black woman and a white man can really make a relationship work. After Brian requests a "night off" from discussing race, Kenya argues that office racism ("the white folks at the plantation") and racial prejudice ("the black tax") prevent her -- and all black people -- from ever having a "night off." When Brian exclaims, "I'm not black and I'll never be black," the dialogue infiltrates volatile and poignant issues.
While Something New deserves commendation for such piercing moments, at times certain characters preach to an audience that has already joined the choir. By the end of the film, it is clear that only Brian can nourish Kenya's spirit, prune her inhibitions and tend to her sensuality. Males in Kenya's life clarify this point -- her father says, "He's just white, not a martian," and her friend stresses, "It's about a love connection."
Although the audience, already witness to Kenya and Brian's true love, may find such messages didactic and preachy, Kenya needs to hear them before she can, as her girlfriends say, "Let go, let flow."
While Brian may seem immune to society's judgment, Kenya, like most people in today's world, is not -- at least, not at first. In the gray area of interracial romance, she, like the viewer, discovers a black and white harmony.
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