500 Years Later: Directors Cut
by Owen Alik Shahadah
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DVD details
Actor: Amiri Baraka, Dr. Francis Cress Welsing, Dr. Kimani Nehusi, Molefi Kete Asante, Nelson GeorgeDirector: Owen Alik Shahadah
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Unknown)
Format: NTSC
Running Time: 108 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2006-10-01
Audience Rating: G (General Audience)
Studio: Halaqah Media Films
DVD Reviews of 500 Years Later: Directors Cut
DVD Review: A LONG NARRATIVE OF VICTIMHOOD Pt. 2
Summary: 1 Stars
I waited in vain for some useful information, or some new or original insights.....instead;from begining to end the film remained mired down in "long narratives of victimhood".
Our brave and hearty ancestors walked down the long dusty dangerous roads of the South after the Civil War, for the most part uneducated,dead broke, with no legal rights or protection, with enemies at every turn.
They chose life. They did not despair, they did not allow their enemies to define them or to dictate to them a world view. They defined themselves and created strong stable communities that allowed us to come into being....if our slave ancestors had the philosophy of endless victimhood of this documentary they would have curled up and died in the woods. None of us would be here!!
The tone of this documentary was one of hopelessness and despair. Only rarely did a fleeting positive perspective manage to rise above the noise of long dreary antedotes and self-deprecating opinions. In the background, sad and melodramatic sounds of violins (European style) only added to the sense of depression and gloom.
At times, one would think they were watching a typical 5:30 evening news telling us of the "crises in the inner city". Bill Cosby even spewed out his criticism of African people in America more than once. Babies out of wedlock. Jail populations; you have heard it all before!! We all know that Bill Cosby remains silent when he has a chance to criticize the powerful.
I guess it is so much safer to criticize poor uneducated Black women.....
I was on the verge of turning off the DVD player when I saw a picture of several of Diop's books. Maybe an informative interview with some new presenters, maybe this will mark a shift in tone and outlook. Maybe Paul Robeson Jr. would speak about his father . Maybe Maulana Karenga will talk about Ifa or Maat, or maybe Asante will offer helpful insights from the works of Diop or Obenga..maybe somebody would explain the concept of Ori of the Yoruba or Chi of the Ibo...? Maybe Dr. Obenga would be interviewed.....Maybe someboby would rise out of the mire and speak boldly and confidently in the spirit of Diop or Garvey or Malcolm.
I waited only to be dissapointed when the long line of dreary presenters ,from various parts of the world, started all over again: "we need to do this....or that"... One obscure musician with a British accent and a sad and depressed look on his face, managed to mumble something about"other people" do this why can't black people..... This transatlantic PITY PARTY went on and on and on with a seemingly endless number of depressing observations and whining opinions. They simply repeated all the negative themes used by the West in their attempt to demoralize African people.
They all seem to have been chosen for the severity of their depression or the complexity of their neurosis.
Most of them seemed dead on a cultural, spiritual and intellectual level. Perhaps they had one foot in and one foot out of the Euro-centric intellectual paradigm and thats enough to depress and confuse anybody!!!They appeared to have been shattered psychologically by the Euro-centric intellectual tyranny that dominates academia in the United States and Europe. Did they want the Western world to validate their opinions? They seemed troubled and trying to convince themselves that they really believed or even understood Obenga and Diop.
Finally it was over. And a pensive and weary looking Dr. Molefi Asante appeared on screen and uttered with force and conviction an almost Diopian closing statement, but it was far too little and far too late to save this long, sorry, dreary film.
May I have my money back please!!!!
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