The Skeleton Key Analysis

With the illegalization of segregation and the election of a black president, white Americans are quick to say that racism is a thing of the past. It is true that in the U.S., nicknamed appropriately as the great “Melting Pot”, cultural exchange is far from rare. However, in far too many cases, cultural appreciation is used as an excuse for the racist or ignorant to use artifacts or participate in practices sacred to an oppressed culture. White Americans specifically often feel a certain entitlement to appropriate culture, but will play the role of the victim when called out for racism. My analysis will focus on The Skeleton Key (Iain Softley, 2005) as a reflection of the ingrained systemic racism in American culture. Employing the horror genre …show more content…
In the very first scene, Caroline notifies an African American nurse that one of her patients, also an African American, has passed, and the nurse seems to be apathetic, acknowledging the notice with a simple nod and then walking off. The next scene, as Caroline waits with the man’s personal items believing that his family will come to collect them, another black nurse tells her to just “dump them out back”, stating that the family doesn’t want anything to do the patient. This reflects not only on the nurse’s lack of sympathy for the recently deceased patient but also on the patient’s family’s apathy. Conversely, Caroline, the film’s white protagonist, is depicted as compassionate and patient, reading to the sick man until he passes and refusing to dispose of his belongings. As Wester notes in her analysis of the abject racism in The Skeleton Key, the film depicts black women as incapable caregivers, failing to nurture even members of their own communities. In just the first two minutes of the film, Softley has effectively established contrasting attitudes toward white people and black people that’ll linger in the back of viewers’ minds as they watch the rest of the