Standard disclaimer! I am incapable of doing this type of thing without some use of spoilers. You have been warned.
The Pan African Film Festival website can be found here. It is not dial-up friendly, and there's nothing you can do to stop that irritating song from launching every single time you click a page. Make your peace with that before you clicky.
The definition of terms can be found here.
Film: 1802: Freedom Now (links to a site in French)
Director: Christian Lara
Writer: Same
Stars: There are a lot of names on that website but they are in French, and without pictures I can't link actor to character I can't give you my version of who stars in this movie.
Awards: Maybe so. The problem is everything I can find is in FRENCH.
Genre: Action-based historical costume drama.
Country: Guadeloupe, a former colony of...guess. No, really. Guess!
Two years ago, Prof. Gerald Horne came to Esowon on tour with his book about the WWII Japanese propaganda efforts targeting the European colonies. During his talk he mentioned that France abolished slavery for about 10 years, but then decided to bring it back. (I'm GREATLY simplifying.) Bringing it back involved Napoleon sending off armies down to the islands to deal with the black people who didn't really want to be slaves again. After slavery was reinstated in the French colonies, it was several many decades before it was abolished for the second time.
I was not the only person in the audience to go !!! WTF !!! at this revelation. A few emails later, Horne pointed me in the right direction for finding more info. This movie is about that very topic. Of course I had to check it out.
The first thing to say is this is a perfectly serviceable ABC Afterschool Special. It wasn't until the q/a with the director after the credits rolled that a retroactive light bulb went off on my head about why that is, though. He did it this way on purpose.
I took notes! I have quotes from him! I'm very tired so I'll add that stuff to this post tomorrow sometime, but there's one bit you need to know now. This is Lara's second film exploring this topic. He said the first, "Bitter Sugar," which came out in 1998 "was intellectual, nobody understood it. I made this film (1802) as the action version people could understand. This one has been more popular."
I've said it before, I'll probably be saying it again every day for the rest of my life, but I wish to god James was still alive so I could share things like that with him and delight in his reaction.
Lara said he wrote this movie "all of my life" in a way. He said his grandfather was the first black historian of Guadeloupe.
The good stuff! This is a perfectly good ABC Afterschool Special, with the added bonus of gunplay and costumes. One thing that was cool was how Lara showed how the women of Guadeloupe took part. There was no huddling in Helms Deep weeping when all hands were needed on deck: these women had guns and knives and ran around splattered in blood with their fists in the air screaming "freedom"! I thought that was great. Usually, even in works dealing with a guerilla war, you don't get to see the women throw down. And their hair? Fabulous! All that guerilla fighting did not muss the hair. Update! (2/16): In the q/a Lara said it . "From history women have always been the first to fight. It just is never said." Along those lines, I personally liked the selective use of dirt and grime. Also, much eye candy for men and women to enjoy, a lot of it involving people frolicking in rivers, pools and waterfalls. Perhaps most importantly, this movie works as an introductory educational tool. Sit a bunch of kids (or inadequately informed adults such as myself) down in front of this movie, and they'll walk away with enough of a sense of what happened and how in school the bastards never told us what was behind some of the uprisings in the French colonies. It wasn't just they didn't want to be slaves. It was they were former slaves who had not been slaves for 10 years, and then Whitey decides they had to be slaves again! Some viewers might be inspired enough to go learn more on their own, and what fun they will have dealing with levels of grrr as they learn the full scope of what was behind that decision of the French. This movie helps in the effort of recovering suppressed history.
Update! (2/16): In the q/a, Lara said they don't really teach this side of the story in the schools. He made this movie because he wanted to make people, particularly youth, aware of it. " These [people in the movie] were fighting for a better future for everybody."
He said he was glad it was being screened in front of black Americans because "We have the same story of slavery," and we should be aware of what happened throughout the diaspora.
He said that whole liberty/fraternity/egality of the revolution is all over the place, but not so much teaching about the failure to apply those principles to the colonies. He said that though two years ago France passed a law stating slavery is a crime (I'm unclear if this was a symbolic act of legislative retroactive apology, or if they were talking about current forms of slavery...he/his translator were talking fast) doing so was like offering crumbs. "France is a very racist country. It is different than here. Here there is a clear community, there is a black community, there is a white community. There, the black French want to be white French, or French I should say. You believe that you want to belong, but you never do belong. You're not allowed."
The plot! A young Napoleon sends one of his generals and a whole bunch of soldiers to Guadeloupe to explain to the people why they have to go back to being slaves. Most of the black officers decide not to go along with it, and with the help of an army comprised of soldiers and locals they try very hard to retain their freedom. They put up a good fight, ultimately they lose. But they lose really heroically and with drama. They get to die For The Cause like the white heroes do in movies! They get to serve as the example of heroic sacrifice and inspiration for future generations.
The plot holes! As an ABC Afterschool Special, there is no subtlety in character or approach to story, there's a lot of compression & much jumping around as we get the highlights of historical events. Perhaps there were some highlights dwelled upon beyond was was necessary (though part of me did like the scene with the writing of the 'we are free' speech), while others are glanced at and we're out (I'm going to guess the budget stuff he talked about is the reason we didn't get to see the black soldiers, having been stripped of their uniforms and weapons when Napoleon's boy arrives, thrown into irons in a ship floating off shore.) Unlike your standard ABC Afterschool Special, there is a fairly large cast of historical figures we (USA audience) are largely unfamiliar with, so it's a little difficult keeping track of who is who outside of the big players, even though they each Speechify an introduction of themselves.
Music: Overt.
Application of the first rule: I'm going to have to come back to this one. Need to sleep on it. Update! (2/16): It's medium.
Application of the Sledgehammer Rule: Dude. ABC Afterschool Special. Bang away.
Update! (2/16): In the q/a, Lara talked more about why he wanted to show this story to his nation's youth, why they have to know they have historical role models, too. "A man should have dignity. He should be free, he should win his freedom even when he has little means. I would prefer Guadeloupe be independent with a little than be dependent with a lot."
Reaction of 13-year-old boy who is my inner essence: Totally into it for the whole thing.
Application of Julia Phillips rule: Rental is fine. More on this point, later. Update! (2/16): So I'm sitting there wondering why on earth this movie shot in the islands was seriously lacking in scenery. There's a battle on the beach, the one on the volcano, running across the fields and so forth. But all the shots are tight, nothing big wide and expansive to show off how pretty is the island. Turns out that's because this was a low-budget project shot in eight weeks, and they had to keep the shots tight so that we couldn't see that all around was Guadeloupe in full modernity.
Die Whitey index: High, but mainly due to the subject matter. Update! (2/16): During the q/a he talked about the continued problems the descendants of the colonies have dealing with the descendants of the colonial rulers. "We are not completely French. We are French 'outside'. A black man will never be French. Here you are an American. There, you are asked 'where are you from?' You say 'I am French', they say 'yes, but where are you from?'
Hotness index: Medium. Update (2/16): Okay, actually it was high, but somehow it feels inappropriate to describe an ABC Afterschool Special as filled with hotties.
Additional PAFF screenings: Feb. 15, 1:20 p.m. Take the children. Believe me, the violence in this is tame compared to what's in those videogames you don't know about that they're playing online.
Was Quentin there? No
Random tidbit: More related to the film tomorrow. Unrelated, people came out of The Inevitable Undoing of Jay Brooks, which screened before this one, absolutely RAVING. Some of them were bouncing and everything. The summary of this movie provided in the schedule made it sound like a chick flick, which is the main reason I decided to avoid it, but what the audience was saying didn't sound CF. Hmmn. Even though it's about a black comic book geek I can't go see it because the final screening is up against a crime flick, a BBC drama and Amiri Baraka, but people were so on fire about this movie I felt I should mention it. Plus, the kid from Deep Space 9 is in it, and I think I saw him in the hallway. My Trekdar went off.
Omigod! I can get to bed before 2:30!