Mixing Nia

Nia is a mixed race woman working in an ad agency who leaves when forced to market beer to young inner-city blacks. She sets out to write a novel and, by doing so starts on a voyage of discovery regarding her own identity.

Karen Parsons is not a great actress - she's probably best known for Hilary in "The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air" series, however here she does manage to lend an air of believability to her mixed up character. Changing her impression of her identity in line with her men: she is passionately pro-black when dating her Afro-American studies professor while care free and yuppie-style when dating her work colleague. She manages to convey the roots of her confusion without having to overplay any scenes in particular.

Supporting cast are uniformly great - Isaiah Washington stands out as the professor who may be more racially intolerant than her racist colleagues. None of the characters are overly stereotyped (in fact black stereotypes are made fun of in comic interludes) but rather come across as ordinary people who gradually expose themselves to be as messed up about race as Nia is.

The overall message that each person should find there own identity based on your experience rather than basing yourself on a culture or a lifestyle is simply made but is not done in a patronising way - in fact when the point is spelt out for the audience we've already been allowed to decide this for ourselves.

This is not rocket science - a gentle story that has a set point to make and makes it in a comic, entertaining and rewarding manner.