Black And White

WASHINGTON -- A robust economy and years of government pressure have helped move minority groups closer to the mainstream. But when it comes to health, studies show a stubborn, daunting and in some respects growing disparity between black and white Americans.For decades, blacks have suffered higher death rates from nearly all major causes. Although life expectancy has increased for all groups, differences persist. And government and academic research shows a widening gap between blacks and others in the incidences of asthma, diabetes, major infectious diseases and several forms of cancer.

NEW YORK - Every media circus needs its sideshow. Michael Jackson's acquittal Monday appeared to leave the Rev. Al Sharpton, a Jackson adviser and major megaphone for racial anger, in the awkward position of having precious little to be angry about. "I think the criminal justice system has worked this time," Mr. Sharpton shouted over the midtown Manhattan traffic into a bouquet of microphones. "I think this is a vindication for people that believe people are innocent until proven guilty.

"Black and White" is as nasty and cynical a film as any to come down the pike this year. Starting with a raunchy and gratuitous scene of three people having sex in Central Park and devolving into a free-for-all of jittery, aimless improvisation, James Toback's latest movie feels less and less like a film and more like an excuse for the director to work out yet another batch of his notoriously varied sexual issues. With its cast of rap stars, young up-and-comers and slumming super-models, "Black and White" is supposed to be an edgy, urban exploration of affluent teen-agers' co-opting of hip-hop culture.

Our great national soap opera is over.Now we have real life to deal with.O.J. walks into the sunset, a free man. Actually, he drives off in a white van, news helicopters trailing him along the freeway, in yet another slow-speed chase. When O.J. gets home, he's met by his buddy A.C. Cowlings, the driver in the original chase. You can't do parody of this story.Maybe you can't do it justice either.But there is real life here. I'll give it to you quick, even more quickly than the 12 jurors -- tried and true and in one hell of a hurry to get home -- could manage.

If the exhibition of black-and-white photography that opened at Maryland Art Place last weekend is any indication of what we can expect from this weekend's Artscape festival as a whole, then it's going to be tremendous. The MAP exhibition, titled simply "Artscape - Black and White," brings together 45 works by 19 area artists who continue to work in this time-honored medium. The show, curated by Baltimore photographer Carl Clark, is an homage not only to the unique qualities of black-and-white imagery but also to the rich visual heritage of Baltimore and the men and women who have documented it. Any large group show like this invariably works only when certain conditions are met. One, no matter how different the photographers' approaches and subject matter, they have to be united by a coherent theme.

WASHINGTON -- President Clinton, seeking ways to capitalize on momentum from the Million Man March, is considering holding a White House conference on race relations and appointing a blue-ribbon commission to study the problem, aides said yesterday.Black leaders have appealed for Mr. Clinton to appoint such a commission to address the march's message -- an appeal for new approaches to the plight of black males. And the idea quickly drew support from Republicans as well as Democrats.But the impulse to build on the positive feelings engendered across the nation by the spectacle of more than 400,000 black men assembled on The Mall in the name of atonement and personal responsibility was also tinged with caution.

SAN DIEGO -- In a commencement address at a scenic University of California campus here tomorrow, President Clinton will urge Americans to take stock of their actions, their words and even their hearts as the nation hurtles toward a more multicultural and ethnically diverse future.The setting would seem to be fitting. In the last decade of the 20th century, Southern California has been the scene of a deadly race riot and the divisive murder trial of O. J. Simpson. Angry California voters passed one controversial initiative, Proposition 187, outlawing social spending on illegal immigrants, and Proposition 209, that does away with state-sanctioned affirmative action programs.

In movies and on television, white is black. And black is now white. African-American actor Ving Rhames, in a revival of the 1970s TV detective series Kojak, premiering tonight on the USA Network, has the role once played by the Greek-American actor Telly Savalas. And in film, white actor Ashton Kutcher is reprising the part of the fiance played by Sidney Poitier in Guess Who's Coming to Dinner. The remake, which opens today, is called Guess Who. The pattern extends beyond the big and small screens, with James Earl Jones and Leslie Uggams about to open in a Broadway revival of On Golden Pond in roles originally played by Henry Fonda and Katharine Hepburn, while Denzel Washington portrays Brutus just down the street at the Belasco Theater in Julius Caesar.

A decade ago, the list of the top 10 TV shows favored by African-American viewers and the list of top shows among all viewers shared only one program: Monday Night Football. But this year, for the first time in a generation, the polls on shows favored by white and black audiences are strikingly similar, in agreement on eight of the top 10. Never in the 20 years that the data from Nielsen Media Research has been systematically compared based on race has such a convergence between black and white TV tastes emerged.

Sin City raises the question, "Does every milestone comic book demand to be made into a movie?" and answers it with a resounding "No." Frank Miller has co-directed three of his own Sin City graphic novels with Robert Rodriguez, who also shot and cut the film, composed the music and plays a corrupt priest. The result is probably the most literal adaptation of a published work ever committed to celluloid - also the most repetitive and assaulting. The grabby graphics exert a hypnotic spell.