It's in a weird place, and it's only getting weirder, but we're Black folks.
cowboy but I'm Black so don't call me boy, just like Linus, and what dat melanin do
¿What you heard?
Pan African Film Festival (PAFF) directors’ brunch.
Someone asks guest speaker Carl Seaton to speak on the state of the industry.
“It’s in a weird place,” he acknowledges. “And it’s only getting weirder, but we’re Black folks. It’s never been okay for us.”
We laugh because he’s right.
Black cinema is full of creative cowboys who turned tumbleweeds into art.
Oppressed by the distant horizon of my career frontier, I wonder…
What weeds can I rustle? What piss can I drink? What fire can I start to survive in this—
Suddenly, a stirring.
A sign of life in this desoLAtion!
I look down, and I see it — six-fingered and sloppy with spaghetti all over its face, a creature still gangly and unsightly in its adolescence — AI, the kindling for my generation of independent Black artistry.
What you doin’?!
I detest mindless chattery with hungry buttkissers and desperate bullshitters that I don’t know, but thankfully, the networking after the PAFF brunch was much better than I expected.
At the end of it all, one of the folks I’d been chatting up told me how surprised he was. My lil introduction at the microphone had been so quick and unassuming.
He had no idea I’d be all the bigness that I am.
The restrained exterior is more instinctual than intentional, simply a survival strategy.
I rock up to uncomfortable shindigs like this — or my best friend’s wedding reception — with a Blackity-Black t-shirt that’s at least an XL on purpose, my Linus security blanket wrapping around me as I suck my thumb and suss out the shittery.
What you seen??
WIDOWS (2018) demonstrates the power of diverse voices in film.
The original Widows (1983-1985) was a British television series whose only non-white lead was recast after she left due to racial and sexual abuse just months before committing suicide.
Steve McQueen though casts not one but three non-white leads (Cynthia Erivo’s film debut!) in his Widows alongside commentary on interracial relationships, race in politics, and anti-Black police violence.
Blacula (1972), same shit.
The original Irish story, often interpreted as antisemitic racial purity propaganda, is reworked with African nobility and staunch anti-slavery discourse from the opening scene.
Woah.
That’s what melanin do in media.