Views On African Cinema
Shahadah sees film as an instrument of mass persuasion, which has been traditionally used to foster a negative image of African people globally, he therefore believes film is one of the most potent weapons to re-image African and solidify a Pan-African identity. Owen Shahadah is a critic of Nollywood and popular “African American cinema” which he believes cheapens the perception of African culture; “it re-emphasizes, by imitation, a culturally shallow notion of African people, it serves more for the entertainment of Europeans than anything else.” But he praised Nollywood for its economic impact and for offering an alternative African selection. "Economically Nollywood is a blessing but it must learn to be loyal to the art of the film industry and not capitalism."
Read more about this topic: Owen 'Alik Shahadah
Famous quotes containing the words views, african and/or cinema:
“It is surely a matter of common observation that a man who knows no one thing intimately has no views worth hearing on things in general. The farmer philosophizes in terms of crops, soils, markets, and implements, the mechanic generalizes his experiences of wood and iron, the seaman reaches similar conclusions by his own special road; and if the scholar keeps pace with these it must be by an equally virile productivity.”
—Charles Horton Cooley (1864–1929)
“I think it’s unfair for people to try to make successful blacks feel guilty for not feeling guilty.... We’re unique in that we’re not supposed to enjoy the things we’ve worked so hard for.”
—Patricia Grayson, African American administrator. As quoted in Time magazine, p. 59 (March 13, 1989)
“The cinema is not an art which films life: the cinema is something between art and life. Unlike painting and literature, the cinema both gives to life and takes from it, and I try to render this concept in my films. Literature and painting both exist as art from the very start; the cinema doesn’t.”
—Jean-Luc Godard (b. 1930)