Black female empow­er­ment in Bring It On

At first glance, Bring It On appears to be about lit­tle more than the super­fi­cial con­cerns of new­ly-crowned Cheer Cap­tain of the Ran­cho Carne Toros, Tor­rance Ship­man (Kirsten Dun­st). And that sum­ma­tion is large­ly true until 20 min­utes into the film, when the East Comp­ton Clovers, a cheer team com­prised of Black and POC mem­bers, are revealed to be the orig­i­na­tors of all the Toros’ cham­pi­onship-win­ning routines.

It is at this point the film takes a sur­pris­ing turn into explor­ing cul­tur­al appro­pri­a­tion and the harm of white priv­i­lege, as the Clovers’ Cheer Cap­tain, Isis (Gabrielle Union) con­fronts Tor­rance and deliv­ers the immor­tal line, ​“I know you didn’t think a white girl made that shit up”.

After a catchy open­ing cheer dream sequence, Tor­rance wakes up scream­ing as the fan­ta­sy turns into a night­mare, a man­i­fes­ta­tion of her fear of fail­ure. Lit­tle does she know her wor­ries are com­plete­ly found­ed. The blonde, bub­bly all-Amer­i­can girl bests every­one in the wealthy, (almost) all-white cheer squad to claim her Cap­tain crown; it’s a clas­sic under­dog tale, just not in the way the film ini­tial­ly por­trays. ​“You’re in for a rude awak­en­ing,” Mis­sy (Eliza Dushku), the new bad girl cheer­leader, tells Torrance.

But this reck­on­ing doesn’t arrive as expect­ed. After telling the rest of the squad of her find­ings, the ini­tial shock turns to full defence as Tor­rance is over­ruled by the team. One squad mem­ber inter­rupts: ​“I don’t give a shit, we learned that rou­tine fair and square, we logged the man hours… this isn’t about cheat­ing, this is about winning!”Another cheer­leader quips: ​“How are East Comp­ton going to prove any­thing?” It’s here we see the true face of white priv­i­lege, as the Toros know full well they will be able to manip­u­late a sys­tem that has allowed them to thrive. There’s lit­tle sense of remorse, only the fear of los­ing their dubi­ous­ly gained status.

While Tor­rance is torn and Mis­sy looks at the rest of the team con­temp­tu­ous­ly, they too go along with using the stolen rou­tines, their indig­na­tion not enough to right the wrongs against the Clovers. Bring It On feels par­tic­u­lar­ly per­ti­nent to today’s cli­mate, where debate around ​“can­cel cul­ture” is rife; the rich white team aren’t real­ly held account­able for their actions. The Clovers con­front the Toros on their home turf, per­form­ing yet anoth­er one of their stolen rou­tines simul­ta­ne­ous­ly with the white squad.

It’s only when the threat of pub­lic humil­i­a­tion rears its head that the Toros decide to find a new rou­tine for Region­als. Iron­i­cal­ly, they hire an expen­sive chore­o­g­ra­ph­er who imbues them with the pow­er of spir­it fin­gers, a ton of body dys­mor­phia issues, and a ter­ri­ble rou­tine that he has also taught five oth­er squads. Even with the means to secure an expen­sive coach, the team is still caught cheat­ing and is giv­en a free pass to Nation­als on the grounds that they won the pre­vi­ous year. They avoid being ​“can­celled” despite tak­ing every wrong turn.

While the film’s pri­ma­ry focus is the Toros, we’re also giv­en glimpses into the Clovers’s world and the sto­ry is rich­er for it. Despite their obvi­ous tal­ent, the Clovers are unable to ful­fil their poten­tial due to their low-income back­grounds and insti­tu­tion­al racism. They work hard and remain unre­ward­ed, so it makes sense that they are a lit­tle jad­ed. At times in the film, the world-weari­ness that comes from grow­ing up Black in a racist world comes across as hard­ness. They’re depict­ed as intim­i­dat­ing, with their white peers almost cow­er­ing when they approach (the term ​“unfriend­ly black hot­ties” coined in Mean Girls comes to mind).

Cru­cial­ly, how­ev­er, Bring It On just about man­ages to avoid the ​“angry black woman” stereo­type pre­sent­ed in oth­er dance-based teen movies like Save the Last Dance. Isis is por­trayed as a strong leader who cares about gain­ing her team vis­i­bil­i­ty and the oppor­tu­ni­ties they deserve. Though unearned, she even gives Tor­rance advice on how her team could improve and class­i­ly side-steps her attempt to give mon­ey to the Clovers so they can go to Nationals.

“Why do you have to be so mean,” Tor­rance com­plains as Isis rips up the cheque, ​“I’m just try­ing to do the right thing” – the irony being that she only attempts to do the right thing when her hand is forced. Isis refus­es to play into white guilt and respectabil­i­ty pol­i­tics and asserts that the Clovers don’t need their help. She’s right – the team is able to secure fund­ing from a local talk show host from their neigh­bour­hood. Dis­card­ing a white sav­iour nar­ra­tive allows us to see Black and minor­i­ty enth­ic com­mu­ni­ties sup­port­ing each oth­er where insti­tu­tion­al sys­tems have failed them.

After the high-octane, hair­spray-fuelled Nation­als, the Clovers beat the Toros to take first place along with a cash prize of $20,000. While in many ways the Clovers are antag­o­nists in the film, their win feels not only deserved but just. This is helped by the Toros feel­ing con­tent with their sec­ond place sta­tus; every­one is hap­py with the out­come. Tor­rance proves her­self as Cap­tain, gets a cute punk boyfriend and con­cedes to the loss hon­ourable: ​“You guys were bet­ter,” ​“We were, huh?” Isis agrees.

To have an end­ing where the Black char­ac­ters aren’t the pro­tag­o­nists but still come out on top feels almost fan­tas­ti­cal; in real life, jus­tice often isn’t served, espe­cial­ly in regards to black girls and women. But in this campy high school flick, Black girls are able to see them­selves reach their poten­tial, take con­trol of their agency and suc­ceed on their own terms.