The Wonderful Movie The Color Purple

Added: 11/21/2007

The Color Purple was a breakthrough movie on many levels and a record breaking movie on other levels. It started the film career to two of the most famous women in show business today and caused an Oscar snub to one of the greatest movie directors of all time. The Color Purple was based on an award winning book and even the book’s author admits that the movie is nothing like her book.

The Color Purple is a breakthrough movie directed by Stephen Spielberg and released in 1985. By the time it had gone through its initial release The Color Purple had become an anticipated movie that blossomed into a box office smash, it had launched the career in feature films for one major female movie star, it added to the resume of possibly the most famous female entertainment star on the world, and it set a record as the most nominated film at the Academy Awards to not win a single gold statue. The original book for The Color Purple was written by Alice Walker and the screenplay was adapted by Menno Meyjes. While Alice Walker’s writing credits are short she will always be remembered for her powerful story in The Color Purple. The director of The Color Purple was directing legend Steven Spielberg and Alice Walker was very unsure if someone like Steven Spielberg could correctly portray her book on film. Up to this point Steven Spielberg was known for movies like The Goonies and Close Encounters Of The Third Kind. But it was the way Steven Spielberg portrayed the character of ET in his movie ET: The Extra Terrestrial that convinced Alice Walker that Spielberg was the man for the job. Walker said that ET came off to her like a character of color.

The Color Purple was Whoopi Goldberg’s first feature film and Oprah Winfrey’s first movie of any kind. Because of her work in The Color Purple Whoopi Goldberg went on to a successful movie career. Oprah didn’t really need the extra exposure as she was already on her way to super stardom as one of the most famous women in the entire world. But both Goldberg and Winfrey were nominated for their work in The Color Purple. In all The Color Purple was nominated for 11 Academy Awards and wound up winning none. It had 3 nominations for best supporting actress, a nomination for best music, and even a nomination for best picture. But The Color Purple was always a bride’s maid and never a bride at the Oscars. All of these Oscar nominations even caused a little but of controversy when out of 11 Oscar nominations there was not one nomination for Spielberg as best director. Some consider this one of the biggest oversights in the history of the Academy Awards.

Alice Walker did not like the movie The Color Purple the first time she saw it because it looked to her to be made into almost a musical when the story was supposed to have a serious tone to it. But in the theater she was seeing it in she noticed that the audience were loving the movie and later she would go on to admit that while the movie The Color Purple is nothing like the book The Color Purple she still enjoys the movie very much. Through it all The Color Purple was a huge box office success and a huge critical success. It launched a series of careers and added fan to the already strong flame of careers like Oprah Winfrey and Steven Spielberg. The Color Purple was Steven Spielberg’s chance to show his range as a director and he pulled it off in magnificent fashion. The Color Purple was surely a long way from Close Encounters Of The Third Kind but has its place in making Steven Spielberg a Hollywood legend.

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