There remains a lot of disagreement and dispute revolving around a number of aspects of Spring Breakers. There’s talk about the extent to which we’re supposed to judge or pity or criticize or sympathize with these characters, and I’ll touch on that a bit later. One feature that has received its share of attention is the rather risqué roles being taken on by these former child stars. It seems like the prevailing conclusion on this is that it contributes to the thematic crux of the movie, playing into the criticism of the American Dream run amok. If Alien’s dream come true is disturbing and unsatisfying, presumably this is also true for child stars who grow up.
Others have pointed to the racial dimension of the movie, casting Gucci Mane as the antagonist gangster to James Franco’s more central criminal figure. It would seem they identify the black gangsters as being a reductive representation of crime in general, with these white girls being depicted as descending into Black America as symbolic of their fall from grace. There’s some merit to these points, but ultimately they seem to rely on James Franco’s identity as a “wanna-be black man” which is disregarding the backstory and primary motivation of that character altogether. It’s easy to slip into these complicated topics after seeing Spring Breakers, which is a testament to the surprisingly complex layering within the story and its storytelling.
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