Director
Dee Rees
Leading Actors/Actresses
Adepero Oduye
Supporting Actors/Actresses
Pernell Walker, Charles Parnell, Aasha Dvis, Kim Wayans, Sahra Mellesse
Genre
Drama
Language
English
Awards
N/A
Date of Release
2011
Producer
Nekisa Cooper
Setting and Context
Brooklyn - 2011
Narrator and Point of View
POV is that of Alike
Tone and Mood
Dramatic, Serious
Protagonist and Antagonist
Protagonist is Alike. Antagonist is Audrey, her mother.
Major Conflict
Alike is a teenage girl seeking to express herself fully as a lesbian woman, but her mother does her best to make Alike be straight without ever talking about it directly.
Climax
Audrey strikes Alike after she tells her mom that she's a lesbian. Alike applies to a writing program in Berkley and gets in. She tries to reconcile with her mom, in an attempt which doesn't go well, and she leaves for school.
Foreshadowing
Alike changing out of her "club" clothes into ones that are acceptable for her mother on the bus ride home from a night out foreshadows that she has to hide her identity from her family.
Understatement
It is understated (and questionable) that Bina isn't gay and is only spending time with Alike to experiment.
Innovations in Filming or Lighting or Camera Techniques
N/A
Allusions
The film is an allusion to the fact that not everyone who leaves is running, but instead they are choosing their destiny.
Paradox
Bina kisses Alike and spends the night with her intimately. Paradoxically, she rejects Alike in the morning, telling Alike that she isn't gay.
Parallelism
Alike's bus ride from the club to home at the beginning of the film parallels her bus ride to Berkley at the end of the film.
