BlackmanVision Film Production

Kobena Mercer in Welcome to the Jungle introduced the notion of ethnic androgyny to describe Michael Jackson’s paling of his skin and re-shaping his nose. Mercer explores the idea that Michael Jackson changed his skin colour not to be white, but to be a light-skinned Black man. Jackson’s whole remodelling of his hair, face and skin was to make him more lovable and marketable to a wider audience.  Did Jackson believe it was easier to sell himself more successfully as ethnically androgynous than ethnically unambiguous to a  global pop audience? The pop charts are not usually dominated by dark skinned Black men.

People who say he was trying to be white are missing the point entirely and have very little understanding of African descent cultures and the complex relationship to pigmentocracy in the New World. Within African American and Caribbean cultures what is often valued and considered attractive is never white skin but light skin, and hair with the African kink taken out. The so-called desire for people of colour to be white remains a white pre-occupation.

In addition Michael Jackson looked increasingly more gender androgynous as time went by. His maleness disappearing underneath wigs, red lipstick and a made up face. His eyes more wide open and doe like through surgery. He began to look like a mutant version of Diana Ross on whom it was rumoured he modelled his look. This “look” did not and does not hamper record sales. However had he been a hip hop star his career would have sank without a trace.

It has been reported that Joe Jackson, Michael’s father repeatedly told Michael he was ugly, his nose was too big. In addition Michael reported that his brothers also teased him. This form of abuse on top of the physical punishment Michael experienced must have had an effect on Michael’s psyche. So in addition to being incredible driven, he must have also been full of self loathing and doubts about his own enormous talents. It is interesting that the entire family has changed their noses through surgery.

Michael also looked and acted like an effeminate boy and and later man. I am almost certain that this was unsettling to his apparently seeming macho father and teenage brothers.

The tragedy of Michael Jackson to me represents a failure of some African Caribbean/American parents to accept a different kind of masculinity in their sons, other than the posturing posing plastic hypermasculinity now almost compulsory and ubiquitous in African descent culture.

Would Michael Jackson still be alive if he had the strength to be like Prince or Little Richard and just accept who he was – a wonderful effeminate, made-up dandy boy?

Still from Oil Spill - The Exxon Valdez Disaster ©Smoking Dogs Films 2009

Smoking Dogs Films is located in Hackney London. It is made up of John Akomfrah OBE, Lina Gopaul, and David Lawson who were members of the highly acclaimed and award-winning Black Audio Film Collective whose titles included Handsworth Songs and Seven Songs for Malcolm X. Their most recent documentary,  Oil Spill – The Exxon Valdez Disaster, will be transmitted on BBC 2 on the 26th March at 9pm.

Why the name change from Black Audio to Smoking Dogs?
Black Audio dissolved as a collective in 1998 an several members went on to do other things like music, more gallery based work and visual arts. And so the three of us who wanted to continue working in film thought it was time to plant some new grass. Running the collective had been an incredibly complicated political and cultural project involving trade unions, grant making bodies, local councils and television stations. We wanted to do something looser and freer. So the name change was part of the overhaul of priorities and agendas. It offered the possibility to put on hold some of the complex institutional negotiations running a collective entailed.

Also by the end, much of the collective’s project, the fore-grounding of Black representation and alternative narrative strategies had become familiar tropes of Black independent cinema. So the name change was about grappling with and naming our transition/evolution to a new cultural project. When you formulate a new manifesto or adopt a new identity or take on new set of concerns, its really important to signal that in the most iconic way possible. And a name change suggests that – its says we outta here y’all. We on a new tip now, we on the move.

What is the ethos behind Smoking Dogs?
After the fifteen years of collective practice our desire was to create a new atelier in which to do challenging, inspiring, provocative work across a range of platforms – cinema, television, galleries. And to enjoy it!! And so from the beginning the idea was very much to try to widen the visual and narrative possibilities of black related subjects. We want to create a space in which we can continue to have complete control over our output and the conditions of the work.

One of our favorite books is As Serious as Your Life: The Story of the New Jazz (Allison & Busby, 1977) by Val Wilmer. We loved the people she chose as her subjects like Albert Ayler and Ornette Coleman. But more than anything, we loved the title of the book : As Serious As Your Life. And that pretty much became the defining mantra for us : lets do fun and interesting shit. But that’s as serious as our lives. And if we are going to be poor or unpopular, fine. But lets be poor and unpopular our way!

What inspired you to make the film about the Exxon Valdez disaster?

Like the Berlin Wall coming down, or the end of apartheid, the Exxon Valdez disaster was one of those zeitgeist defining events for our generation. It was the first time many of us saw an environmental disaster on that scale, the first inkling of what had changed in our relationship with fossil fuels and when the first green shoots of eco-consciousness started to take root in our souls.

And it happened twenty years ago to the day. We wanted to remind people that it happened and that the effects of that spill are still with us today.

The other thing was just honoring a promise to ourselves to do more environmental based work. Because, the name Smoking Dogs always suggested for us an environmentalist/ecological interest. We are the smoking beagles of those ghastly laboratory experiments with cigarettes!!!

Why do you think people don’t associate people of color with environmental issues?
Part of it is just to do with the metro-centric prism through which “Black politics ” is viewed both within as well outside Black circles. And it is by no means the truth of Black life on the planet. If you live and work in Sub Sahara Africa, environmental questions are not marginal to your life. They frame it in a very concrete way and your political activity or cultural work reflects that. Fela Kuti was singing about multinationals and what they do to the African environment in the 1970s!!

And if you are a South Asian artist working on the subcontinent, what the agri-multinational Monsanto wants to do with rice, is not marginal at all.

The disassociation happens because to be Black is assumed to be a wholly self contained single issue entity. Paul Gilroy calls this racilogical reasoning which is certainly rampant in the broadcast and film worlds. The assumption is if you are Black then all you ever think about or are concerned with are racial issues. But we are not one-dimensional.

When we went to Alaska to make the Exxon film we were warmly received as filmmakers. They were so amazed that we had come all the way from the UK to make a film about an event which happened 20 years ago because many we met knew of our work. They kept reminding us of the awards we had won, our achievements and John’s OBE. It was really humbling and made us feel even more determined to do justice to their story.

They knew and we knew that there some issues that are universally defining. And one of those is about our global relationship to hydro carbon fuels. But it’s also about the impact of those fuels on our planet. So we don’t feel we are trespassing on someone’s patch. It is our land too.

What are you working on next?
We are extending our fictional productions. We have two fictional films in development one based in Africa, one in the UK and a six-part series for here. We are mentoring younger talented film makers to get more exposure for their work. And after so many years we are aiming to film our feature documentary on Fela Kuti later this year

Still from NO! Photo Scheherazade Tillet

Aishah Shahidah Simmons is an award-winning African-American feminist lesbian independent documentary filmmaker, television and radio producer, published writer, international lecturer, and activist based in Philadelphia, PA.

In 1992, she founded AfroLez® Productions, an AfroLez®femcentric multimedia arts company committed to using the moving image, the written and spoken word to address those issues which have a negative impact on marginalized and disenfranchised people.

Her documentary NO! screens at the Institute of Contempoary Arts on March 15th

AfroLez – the name brings up Afrocentricity as well as lesbianism, do you think those ideologies make a difficult marriage?
I’m re-interpreting language and attempting to make it more inclusive. In 1990, I coined the term AfroLez®femcentric to define the culturally conscious role of Black (African descended) women who identify as Afrocentric, Lesbian and Feminist. I created this word to counter the line of thinking which assumes that if you’re of African descent and identify as queer and feminist then you’re not a part of the Black community. There is also an assumption that if you are Black and queer, you don’t have an understanding of racism and/or that you’re not committed to the struggle for the liberation of African descended people throughout the world.

I take this a step further to say that I believe in and support the liberation of ALL marginalized people. I want to envision a world where everyone understands that no one is free while others are oppressed.

How does if affect queer people of African descent negotiating a Eurocentric queer culture?
People of African descent, regardless of our sexual orientation and gender identity, who live in the West are existing in a Eurocentric culture. As a Black feminist lesbian, I personally believe that existing in a specifically Eurocentric queer culture has a negative impact on people of African descent because more often than not the queer identity is centralized at the expense of all other identities.

What’s problematic and troubling for me is that often queer identity is equated with White queer identity while African, Asian, Latino, Arab, Pacific Islander, Aboriginal/Indigenous, Roma/Gypsy queer identities are marginalized in the name of queer unity.

If homophobia and heterosexism ended right now, I would not be safe as an African descended woman. I would still have to fight against racist and sexist oppression. So, I have to incorporate all of my selves in any space. However my herstory and contemporary reality have shown me that more often than not, I’m covertly and overtly asked to leave my racial/ethnic identity at the metaphorical door of Eurocentric queer spaces.

I want to be clear that I’m not saying people of African descent should completely abstain from a Eurocentric queer culture. That’s ridiculous and for many, impossible. I know for many African descended queer people living in various countries in Europe, South American, and/or in some cities/towns in the US and Canada, being in a Eurocentric queer culture is their only option. I am, however, suggesting that we do not negate, deny, marginalize our cultural/racial/ethnic identities while celebrating/living our queer lives.

Why do you make documentaries as opposed to fiction?
While I thoroughly enjoy narrative films, I’m interested in creating a cinematic space where herstorically marginalized women can give their testimonies about their lives. I believe that my choice in filmmaking formats is strongly influenced by my preference for reading non-fiction over fiction. In many ways, NO! is two simultaneous documentaries merged into one. I am feminizing Black history from the time of the enslavement of Africans in the US to the present-day. I am also breaking silence about sexual violence within Black communities in the US. If I weren’t a filmmaker, I think I would’ve been a historian. At some point on my life journey,  I may venture into narrative filmmaking. However, right now I am committed to using the documentary format to tell the stories that have yet to be told.

Where did the idea for NO! come from?
I started making NO! in 1994 and the idea for NO! came from my strong desire to cinematically break the silence that countless Black women have kept (and keep) about the various forms of sexual and physical violence that they experienced (and experience) within Black communities. I also made NO! because I am an incest and rape survivor.

Through my making NO! I literally healed and saved myself. When I started working on the project 15 years ago, I envisioned it solely being used within the African-American community. Little did I know at that NO! would speak directly to and be used by countless women in numerous countries in Africa, South America, the Caribbean, Europe and India. While this speaks to the power of cinematic story telling, this also speaks to the sobering reality of the universality of violence against women.

What are your working on next?
While it took me 11 years to make NO!, I spent additional time creating supplemental materials, which include a 100-page interactive study guide, a 2-hour supplemental video, and subtitling NO! into French, Spanish, and Portuguese. After 14 years of very literally living with both the vision and ultimately reality of NO!, I’m very slowly but surely recuperating from an amazing journey which metaphorically took me to hell and back. Presently, I’m in the very initial stages of my next feature length documentary project on Black Muslim women, which will be a collaboration with my mother Dr. Gwendolyn Zoharah Simmons who is both a practicing Sufi Muslim and a Feminist Islamic Scholar.

NO! screens at the Institute of Contempoary Arts on March 15th

Notorious is  a film about the life and death of Notorious BIG aka Biggie Smalls born Christopher Wallace, legendary East Coast rapper and protege of Sean Combs aka Puff Daddy/P Diddy.

When Biggie Small’s mother Violetta Wallace came to the USA from Jamaica,  like all immigrants from the Caribbean she was chasing the American Dream. Little did she realise that her dream would also be the American Nightmare.  Her son became one of the most successful and respected rappers in a classic rags to riches story, but did not live to see his 25th birthday. His memory lives on and he is a cultural icon to many rap aficionados. But the flip side to his success was also the darker side of rap which eventually led to his early demise.

The film is a simple story about his life, moving from the inevitable chase for “bling” through drug dealing, to eventual worldwide fame on the musical stage.  Notorious is simplistic and superficial in the way it smooths over the testosterone-driven violence that infiltrates inner city neighborhoods like toxic gas. Collecting “benjamins” by exploiting  drug addiction in order to purchase symbols of success drives people to insane acts of terror and immorality. There was a telling scene in the film where Biggie sells drugs to a pregnant woman when his homies refuse. His retort is “I’m not a social worker!’  And as for the the “beef” between himself and Tupac Shakur, Notorious goes all out to present Biggie as the peacemaker and good guy. But then Notorious was produced by Sean Combs, so that would explain the Biggie bias.

The film oozes African American masculine bonding and culture which is handled brilliantly by George Tilman Jr who is also best known for directing Soul Food. This is a man’s film, so don’t come looking for any insight into the women in Biggie Small’s life apart from his amazing mother, played stunningly by Angela Bassett. Other memorable poerformance are given by Jamal Woolard as the adult Biggie, Christopher Jordan Wallace, his own son, as the young boy Biggie. The musical interludes are fantastic and will give fans much to love and rap along with.

And for Violeta Wallace maybe this film has allowed her to come full circle to realise her son fulfilled his dream if not her American one.

Notorious opens in the UK on 13th February 2009

Official Movie site

As we move further into the 21st Century in the Western world and as the Western World criticizes the Muslim countries for their backward attitudes to women. I wonder if we should not be looking closer to home re our exclusion of women from key roles as shapers in the imagination of our “progressive” culture. If we say we are advanced in terms of gender relations how do we show this?

By paying women the same as men for equal work? No. Men still earn 17.5% more than women

By respecting a woman’s right to say no? Er no Domestic violence is up by 41.2% and rape by 24.7%.

So even though Western women are not literally getting stoned in the streets for some minor misdemeanour there are other covert ways of keeping women in their place.

Which brings me back to film and filmmaking. Cinema is a way for people to get lost in a fantasy world. A way to experience life through others eyes, a way of reviewing history, or a way of re-learning our cultures. Film is accessible and visual so has a far reach because any person who has functioning vision or hearing can participate in the magic that is cinema.

But whose world are we re-visioning? It would seem to me that what has crept up on us all, is a view of the world through Eurocentric male eyes. This is somehow being presented to us via mainstream cinema as benign, neutral, and universal entertainment. Meaning that although the themes represented are universal to all humans – love, betrayal, greed, power etc these stories are projected to us through the lens that is instrument of the white male gaze.

What we are being shown in wonderful close up is men’s lives, men’s stories.  It is so blatant that even when a White male vision is transported on to an Indian story as in Slumdog Millionaire there is no comment on the erasing through the non-mention of  the contribution of the Asian female co-director Loveleen Tandan. This somehow leaves a nasty memory of cinema from back in the day when in certain movies the white actresses singing voice was actually provided by non credited African American singers like Etta Moten. Plus ca change?

Is it that women are just really bad at directing great films which is why their names rarely come up for directing awards? Are they really crap at writing screenplays? I am referring to films that the majority of us have easy access to and will have no barriers to viewing.  There is not a single female name in any of directing and writing categories for the BAFTAs.  Would Jane Austen have gotten a film break in 21st Century Britain? The statistics do not look encouraging.

The Oscars are marginally better with Screenplay nominations for Courtney Hunt for Frozen River and for Documentary, Ellen Kuras and Thavisouk Phrasavath for The Betrayal. So is the lesson here that if you are a budding female filmmaker you need to write and direct your own film or stick to docos documentary or  move to the USA? Or be a one off like Phyllida Lloyd and Catherine Johnson the director and writer of Mamma Mia the most successful film in the UK with a  nomination for the Best Motion Picture in the Golden Globes.

Women are 50% of the global population. When is this going to be reflected in filmmaking?

Still from Mississippi Damned - 2009

Mississippi Damned has been chosen as one of the 10 films in competition at the 15th Annual Slamdance Film Festival. It will screen twice while in Park City.  It premieres on January 16th, 2009 at 6pm (MST) and plays again January 20th, 2009 at 10am (MST). It is written and directed by Tina Mabry (Itty Bitty Titty Committee) and co-produced by Morgan Stiff ( Hip Hop Homos). These two inspirational women took time out of their hectic schedule to give BlackmanVision a few insights into their filmmaking magic.

What inspired you to make Mississippi Damned?
Tina: I had seen several films based in the south that centered on the African-American experience, but I didn’t really feel they reflected any of my experiences. I began writing a treatment for a story that would portray southern life as I knew it.  I was interested in exploring what it takes to escape a bad situation when there is no example of how to break the destructive cycles. I hoped that by portraying some of the hardships I encountered in my youth would prevent others from creating these similar hardships.

Morgan: When I read the script that Tina wrote, I immediately saw the power in the story. Coming from the documentary world, I appreciated the attention she paid to make the film real and authentic. I also appreciated that the protagonist and people who occupied this world were people we don’t often see in cinema. Tina was giving a large group of people who are often overlooked a voice.

What were the challenges in raising money for this film?
Tina: With a cast of 34, 109 page script, and shooting a period film, we were presented with the problem of making a film that was nearly been impossible to do with the amount of funding we had. However, winning a $10,000 grant from Kodak, collaborating with companies who would work with the limited funds we had available, and relying on the creativity, determination and resourcefulness of both of the producers made this film possible.

Morgan: We couldn’t raise all the money that would have been ideal to make this movie. However, we didn’t want to sit on the script for years waiting for someone to give us a chance. We believe that you make your own opportunities. So even though we had limited financial resources, we relied on our other strengths to get us through. A lot of it has to do with persistence, ALWAYS seeing another solution to a problem when you face many closed doors. Thinking outside of the box, and working everything you’ve got for what it is worth. We were also fortunate to have the assistance of those who saw our potential. The FIND Filmmaker lab was very instrumental in us getting this film done, as was Kodak. We chose to shoot in North Carolina (where both producers are from) so that we could call in personal favors and rely on the giving nature of our friends and family. So, for a budget that was shy of what we would have liked to have, we successfully finished the film.

What keeps you both going in those dark moments?
Tina: What keeps me going is a need to fill a void we see in the current film industry by providing a voice to those often unheard. Voices of the disenfranchised. We hope to show that the stories of those on the margins are just as profound and entertaining as any considered mainstream. If we truly want to create change in cinema, especially American cinema, we refuse to let potential dark moments affect us.

Morgan: Having a good foundation helps. My producing partner, Lee V. Stiff is not born out of the industry, in fact his full time job is as a professor of Math Education. He always has a way to put things in perspective which is often needed. Besides, we believe in what we’re doing. We want to see people like us on screen. We want to hear stories that go beyond the conventional, stories that challenge our beliefs, our understanding of the world around us. We are encouraged by other artists striving to do the same thing, not only in film, but in music, art, and literature. And when I get to my darkest moments, when I think I’ve exhausted all the possibilities or am just too tired, I think, “Damn, I’m lucky to be able to do this for a living. To be creative day after day. What am I tired for? It’s just beginning, there are still so many stories to be told!”

Watch a trailer of Mississippi Damned.

Precious formerly titled Push is directed by Lee Daniels is based on a novel by Sapphire of the same name. It is worth noting that the word “Sapphire” is one of the stereotypes of Black women in which she is portrayed as strident, aggressive and hostile. This is very often the image of the dark-skinned Black woman prevalent in contemporary popular culture. It also dominates the caricatures of black women by comedians and impersonators.

Push was Sapphire’s first novel and is a relentless story of the physical and sexual abuse of an obese black girl called Clareece Precious Jones. The movie is based on the book is now been directed by Lee Daniels who was the Oscar winning producer of Monster’s Ball. He is the only African American to win an award as a producer.

While i think it is great to see varied roles for Black actresses. It is interesting that an unknown was cast in the role and I am sharing the audition tape for the actress Gabourey Sidibe. What no big dark-skinned actresses out there? Renee Zellweger did put on weight for Bridget Jones. Also all the mainstream film roles for dark-skinned women so far have been for victim women. Just my observation and I am very happy to be proved wrong.

The film premieres at Sundance on the 11th January.

Nina’s Heavenly Delights was the first feature film in the UK by an out Asian lesbian. It is a miracle that this film got funded as no feature film about lesbians directed by lesbians gets funded anymore in the UK. Shocking but true. Usually the films are directed by men.

It is a major achievement and a testament to Pratibha Parmar‘s tenacity and sheer doggedness in the face of dragging feet by a major funding source in the UK that the film completed it’s journey from script to screen. The film has gone on to win international awards. It is really inspiring to me to see that Pratibha has managed to sustain a career sticking to her politics as well as still maintainng a committment to making films that include queer or Asian storylines.

Tyler Perry is the first African American to own a studio and has a long history of making movies. He recently directed The Family that Preys, his sixth film, which has a stellar cast including Kathy Bates, Alfre Woodard and Robin Givens! ( remember her?). The story deals with and upper class and working class family whose destiny becomes linked through scandal.

It is interesting that the film is historical and is not the usual gangster fodder that seems to come out of other studios. I will be watching very closely to see what other films he produces and if the studio is just a vehicle for  himself or if he is interested in creating an infrastructure.  Also will it grow to be a force to be reckoned with, much like African Americans have done with music and fashion. Is it possible anyway with film?

Oscar Micheaux did the same thing in the early part of the 20th Century and is considered the pioneer of Black independent filmmaking in the USA.

What caught my eye and touched my soul in 2008.

1. Bird Club – performance art celebrating the queer feminine. Live, warm and moving.
2. The Genome Chronicles – film by John Akomfrah – commissioned for Donald Rodney Retrospect curated by Keith Piper. Painful, wistful, haunting
3. Transgender Film Festival – inclusive, innovative, challenging
4. Savage Grace – film by Tom Kalin about the doomed heiress Barbara Daly Baekeland and her son Antony – brave, exquisite costumes and cinematography, disturbing
5. MUST – Peggy Shaw and Clod Ensemble’s performance- raw, physical, sinuous, poetic
6. Survivors – TV series population survive deadly virus – uneven performances, integrated casting, 1 queer survivor, annoying, gripping
7. Club des Femmes – female cinema re-visited – political, feminist, counter culture
8. Femmes of Power – photographic essay on queer femininity eds. Del La Grace Volcano, Ulrika Dahl – visual, eclectic, much needed to shift the dominance of butch/andro imagery in queer culture

In 2009 I can’t wait for

1. Mississippi Damned – written and directed by Tina Mabry – three Black children try to escape their abusive situation
2. Push – directed by Lee Daniels based on the novel by Sapphire.
3. Weather Girl – film co-produced by Steak House comedy about an adult woman finding love