"For Colored Girls"

I have to admit, I did not hate the film the way many of you did. I didn't love it, but it had its good moments. It also had its problems, obviously.
First of all, I feel like this movie would have had more of an impact in the 70s, when it was written, as opposed to now. Race is still a significant issue now, but the issues in the movie could have happened to women of any race. To me, the movie was more "For Girls" than for colored girls. It was about the difficulty of dealing with pregnancy, domestic abuse, rape, etc. To me, those issues transcend race. On the other hand, most movies released in mainstream theaters feature mostly white casts. In a way, the title of this movie is fitting, because it has a non-white cast, therefore black women can see women who look like them on the screen. It's their way of saying, even though movies only seem to care about white women's problems, black women have problems too.
Yet this movie really focuses on the problems--I have come to discover that I am not a fan of movies with so many plot lines, especially movies like this, where each plot line is more depressing than the last. I like the idea that they can all support each other, but the melodrama was a bit overwhelming.
Back to the title, and how the movie deals with issues that challenge all women: race is hardly mentioned in the film. When Thandie Newton's character says, "Being colored is a metaphysical dilemma that I haven't conquered yet," I didn't believe her. We're not given reason to believe that her problems are caused by race, or that she is insecure about her race. Many women who are insecure about being colored date white men to avoid their own race. Tanji dated black men. She never talks about her race. Again, maybe the movie would have been more important in the 70s.