'Passing', Fanon, And The Screen
In 1952, Martiniquan theorist Frantz Fanon published the pioneering Black Skin, White Masks, an appropriation of Freud’s work on existentialism which articulated a psychological diagnosis of the effects of racism on a person. In this work, Fanon developed W.E.B. Du Bois’ notion of double consciousness, an expression of the conflicted dual-identity of African Americans: being both Black and Americans, two states of being that seem to be in opposition. Fanon identified this double consciousness within colonised subjects to articulate a psychological, racialized manifestation of Freud’s concept of existential nausea. In Black Skin, White Masks Fanon radicalised academic writing by utilising his own experience as subject: he recalls a moment when a passing white child pointed to him and called him a racial slur. This act of naming, this construction of race, produced in Fanon a visceral reaction, the nausea of being presented with a misdiagnosed self; he became violently aware of the “uniform” imposed upon him by society and its associated rejection. This moment of desperation led Fanon to articulate W.E.B. Du Bois’ concept of double consciousness, now reframed within a colonial context: he wanted to be recognised both as Black by his community and white by society – an impossible position to be in. This produced within him a distressing state of non-being, one which had to be surpassed to transcend racial consciousness, overpowering the hegemonic gaze of his oppressors by accepting and celebrating his skin. This is the psychoanalytical tool that Fanon offers the world, the possibility to recognize one’s racial, existential encounter with double consciousness, and to therapize the self by transcending the constraints of colonialism and race.
Fanon’s legacy is monumental, and his theories echo today across crafts and mediums. One of the artworks elucidated by his work is Rebecca Hall’s Passing, an adaptation of Nella Larsen’s 1929 novella. Passing was released at the end of 2021 and has been available on Netflix for the past three years, but has largely been underrated by critics and film communities, despite powerhouse performances from stars Ruth Negga and Tessa Thompson. Outside of the fantastic acting, Passing is a beautiful, delicate film that gazes at the complex identities of two African American women as they relate to one another and themselves. By analyzing the film through Fanon’s work, we find a surprising response to women's otherwise overlooked interior lives, which complicates and expands on Fanon’s diagnoses.
The story takes place in New York’s Harlem neighborhood in the ‘20s, where Irene, a Black woman, lives with her husband and two children. One day, Irene walks through a wealthy neighborhood and accesses a white-only hotel restaurant by passing as white. It is not a practice she engages with regularly, but rather an indulgence, a vice of transgression. Inside this space of whiteness, Irene unexpectedly encounters Clare, a childhood friend. Clare has chosen to live her life passing as a white woman, married to a prominent white banker who remains violently racist and entirely unaware of her Black heritage. Cinematographer Eduard Grau, originally filmed the scenes in colour, later editing them to be monochromatically toned in black and white. This choice allows the film’s cinematography to emphasise how systemic "colouring" shapes our perception of space and, by extension, race.
In the scene when Irene first sees Clare, the hotel restaurant functions as the spatial constructor of racial identity: the characters and the audience know this is a space restricted to whiteness, therefore Blackness is eliminated. The cinematography psychologically reinforces this hegemony, by surrounding Irene with a bath of white light and white tablecloths. Irene herself wears a delicate white dress, and her blonde hair reflects the light coming from her back. Her face, the indicator of race, is a mattified grey color which matches the light greys of the shadowed details of the room. It contrasts with the dark wood of the seats, the only blackness present. We can already see a cinematic articulation of Dubois and Fanon’s theories of double consciousness at play. Clare has assimilated to her performance as a white woman, as she easily blends with the literal concept of whiteness (the hotel) and the psychological concept of whiteness (the cinematographic gaze). However, this blending with the background expresses Clare’s own non-identity: she is not performing whiteness, she only denies Blackness. It visually and symbolically washes her personhood away; she becomes swallowed by the system of race.
When Clare approaches her old friend, she is ecstatic to be able to engage with her Blackness through their conversation, as Irene is the first person in years who knows of Clare’s secret. Irene, however, is disturbed by Clare’s lifestyle and rejects her friend’s attempts to rebuild their bond. Nevertheless, Clare is inflamed by this reconnection to her Blackness, this desire leads her to intrude into Irene's life, accessing the Harlem neighbourhood and eventually entering Irene's home. As Fanon states in Black Skin White Masks, the Black person needs to relate to the typical constructs of Blackness at the same time as they desire to be white. Clare pursues her Black identity through the spatial intrusion into what she identifies as the root of American Blackness. She wears a black dress, and the greys of her skin tone are made darker by the shadowed room. Behind her (or in front of her) stands Irene, her figure blurry in the mirror. Clare is, therefore, entrapped by the life that she now regrets leaving behind: the physical body of Black-identifying Irene, and the Black home unit as represented by the space she is in. On the other hand, Irene’s identity becomes erased by Clare’s, a body that tells Irene that, despite unhappiness, racial identity can be molded and surpassed. The two women become doubles for one another, embodying the perception of each one’s skin. By being in each other’s proximity, they are made to confront Fanon’s existential nausea again and again.
For Passing, the characters’ surpassing of this nausea does not occur through an acceptance of the self, as the self can never be fully conceptualized due to the cinematographic doubling of Irene and Clare. Instead, the women achieve existential transcendence by extending kindness and love to one another. Their connection may be an expression of racial entrapment, but it also fosters the safety of community. Throughout the film, the relationship between the two women only becomes more complicated and tense. As Clare adapts to the Harlem scene, thereby reclaiming her Blackness, Irene feels more and more forgotten in her domestic life. As Fanon articulates, both Black and white identities cannot coexist simultaneously, therefore the two women are constantly facing erasure and construction as binaries of one another. It is despite this systemically racialized gaze that they transcend nausea, not by therapizing their identity of the self, but by loving one another. Perhaps this is the female experience that Fanon overlooks: womanhood is intrinsically connected to community, to sisterhood. There is no self if it is not relational to the other.
Edited by Humaira Valera, Co-film & TV editor
