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Yvettep
Veteran Poster
Username: Yvettep
Post Number: 1367
Registered: 01-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, October 16, 2006 - 06:34 pm: | 
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(http://tinyurl.com/yay8yb via Negrophile: http://tinyurl.com/y9qvaj)
'The Last King of Scotland' renews debate about racial point of view
Joe Williams
POST-DISPATCH FILM CRITIC
Sunday, Oct. 15 2006
The stories are familiar: The Great White Hunter arrives on the Dark Continent.
A Bible-toting missionary becomes entranced by native rhythms. A selfless aid
worker delivers food to a famine zone. An American corporation sends
mercenaries to overthrow a tribal warlord.
Hollywood rarely has made a movie about Africa without filtering it through an
Anglo character's perspective.
This season, Africa is a trendy topic, and a new spate of movies again raises
old questions about stereotypes and cultural imperialism. In "The Last King of
Scotland," which opened here Friday, the bloody reign of Ugandan dictator Idi
Amin is seen through the eyes of a Scottish doctor played by James McAvoy.
In "Catch a Fire," which opens Oct. 27, Tim Robbins plays a white South African
detective hunting a militant black member of the African National Congress. And
in "Blood Diamond," scheduled for December, Leonardo DiCaprio plays a white
adventurer pursuing a priceless gem in the midst of civil war.
Even in the real world of journalism, stories about Africa often require a
white intermediary before they gain traction. The deaths of millions of blacks
of genocide or starvation don't merit attention on the evening news. But when
Bono or "Brangelina" go on a mission of mercy, the paparazzi follow.
Filmmakers say that casting white stars and the choice of newsworthy subject
matter are factors in getting a project financed. In a documentary about the
making of the "Last King of Scotland," director Kevin Macdonald says the
fictional character of the white doctor helps connect the Western audience to a
story that was aching to be told.
"Up until Nelson Mandela, Idi Amin was the most famous African ever," Macdonald
says. "With the stories about his cannibalism and witchcraft and multiple
partners, he represents all that is worst and most savage about the Dark
Continent."
That's why Amin was good copy in his lifetime and why Forest Whitaker has such
a show-stopping role in the feature film.
If Hollywood is going to focus on famine and war, then the white characters
must bear their share of the responsibility, says Niyi Coker Jr., a Nigerian
who is a professor of African and African-American studies at the University of
Missouri at St. Louis.
"Africa was colonized by the British, the French, the Portuguese, the
Spaniards, the Dutch and the Belgians," Coker says. "Most countries in Africa
did not become independent until the 1960s, so, naturally, some of them are
still struggling.
"It's appropriate to have a movie about Idi Amin, but we should balance it and
say why those things occurred, what are the legacies of colonialism and who are
the people backing these corrupt regimes."
"The Dogs of War," a movie based on a novel by Frederick Forsyth, understood
colonialism, Coker says.
"It's about how an oil company puts together a paramilitary force to go into
Africa and seize control of a country," he says. "Another one was 'Lord of
War,' with Nicolas Cage as an arms trafficker. During the Cold War, these newly
formed governments were receiving arms to fight communists when people in
Africa didn't even know what communists were. Those weapons are still killing
people."
Bobbie Lautenschlager, a local film producer who worked as a medical missionary
in Uganda during the period depicted in "The Last King of Scotland," was
disappointed that the movie focused so much attention on the fictional white
doctor.
"It was silly to insert a subplot about the doctor having an affair with Amin's
wife," she says. "I saw Idi Amin in person at a parade in Kampala, with his own
picture printed on his dashiki. There was enough drama swirling around him,
with his expulsion of the Asians who were the backbone of the economy, that the
movie didn't need to invent any."
Coker says many Africans regard Hollywood depictions of their continent as "a
big joke" because filmmakers don't do the most basic homework in geography,
history and language.
"In 'The Air Up There,' Kevin Bacon recruits a basketball player who is
supposed to be Kenyan. But half of the characters speak with South African
accents," Coker says. "To Hollywood, Africa is just one big, confused
continent. As long as there are people in grass skirts beating drums, the
audience is supposed to understand that it's Africa."
Lautenschlager says Hollywood rarely depicts working-class or professional
Africans, people who are in control of their own lives.
"At a film festival, I saw a wonderful movie called 'Drum,' starring Taye Diggs
as a South African journalist in the 1950s," she says. "It showed black South
Africa as a culture that was rich and vibrant and totally its own. It was a
remarkable film -- and it never got released to the general public."
A rare release with a black African protagonist was "Hotel Rwanda." As the
nation descends into a genocidal chaos that a UN contingent, led by Nick Nolte,
is powerless to stop, a hotel manager played by Don Cheadle saves hundreds of
refugees.
"The world needs to see that there are black heroes," Lautenschlager says.
Local audiences will get to see a different kind of black hero when "Son of
Man" screens at the St. Louis International Film Festival in November. The film
re-imagines Christ as a black man in contemporary South Africa. Like "U-Carmen
e-Khayelitsha," a modern version of the Bizet opera in the Xhosa language, it
was directed by a white Englishman, Mark Dornford-May.
While white South African Gavin Hood won the foreign-language Oscar last year
for directing the hoodlum drama "Tsotsi," black Africa is still waiting to tell
its story. Nigeria has a large movie industry, dubbed Nollywood, but most of
its output is simplistic melodramas shot on video.
Until Africa is able to export a more truthfully positive image of itself, the
world will continue to be duped by Hollywood, Coker says.
"I've taken a lot of white students to Africa and, when they get there, they
realize they've been lied to," he says. "They are shocked to see normal life --
people driving cars, eating in restaurants, going to clubs. They see a
different level of humanity than they get in the movies."
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Abm
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Abm
Post Number: 6716
Registered: 04-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, October 16, 2006 - 06:37 pm: |
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Yvettep,
Honestly. When Africa and Black foks as a WHOLE get their stuff together, this "Great White Hunter" shyt WON'T happen. |
Ntfs_encryption
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Ntfs_encryption
Post Number: 1009
Registered: 10-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, October 16, 2006 - 09:04 pm: |
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"When Africa and Black foks as a WHOLE get their stuff together, this "Great White Hunter" shyt WON'T happen."
Figure the odds of that happening........ |
Chrishayden
AALBC .com Platinum Poster
Username: Chrishayden
Post Number: 2849
Registered: 03-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Thursday, October 19, 2006 - 05:04 pm: |
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They'll have to unite
They'll have to get nukes |
Ntfs_encryption
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Ntfs_encryption
Post Number: 1014
Registered: 10-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Thursday, October 19, 2006 - 07:13 pm: |
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"They'll have to unite
They'll have to get nukes"
Again, figure the odds of that happening........ |
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