ADIFF ’15: Let the Music Talk

Alex Pascall was sort of the Gil Noble of London. He is widely credited with establishing a voice for Britain’s West Indian community on mainstream radio and television. As one of the founders of the Notting Hill Carnival, he had a clear affinity for music. Pascall surveys the diverse black British musical scene in one of his best known broadcasts when he served as the host of Yvonne Deutschmann’s Let the Music Talk, which screens during the 2015 African Diaspora International Film Festival in NewYork.

Appropriately, Let starts with what could be considered day one of British calypso history when Lord Kitchener arrived on the HMT Empire Windrush (a British war trophy confiscated from Germany), improvising a performance of “London is the Place for Me” for Pathé News. American audiences might be surprised by the considerable time then afforded to British gospel music, but it clearly provided similar inspiration and fortification for many devout British immigrants. Deutschmann and Pascall also a good deal of spend time with the traditional Masqueraders, the Grenada Shortknee Band, who actually sound better in their rehearsal segment than during their full dress performance.

There are additional performances by the funky soul band The Real Thing, the other chart-topping quartet from Liverpool, representing the Mersey Sound and Eddy Grant, a year before he released his biggest hit, “Electric Avenue.” However, the coolest part of the film is the in-studio interview and performance with Coleridge Goode, the revered free form jazz bassist who played on seminal Joe Harriott and Michael Garrick sessions.

While it clocks in just under an hour (as you would expect of a 1981 BBC one-shot TV doc), it features some wildly groovy, catchy up-tempo performances. It is also impressive how “undated” Let feels, aside from its 1981 production values. It is a significant television music broadcast most Americans have never seen, so any fan of two or three of the assembled genres (reggae, calypso, funk, gospel) should definitely check out Let the Music Talk when it screens this Thursday (12/10) at the Bow Tie Chelsea as part of the special Black British theme program (which also includes the highly entertaining fest favorite The Story of Lover’s Rock) at this year’s ADIFF.

ADIFF ’15: Hear Me Move

It is like a South African Step Up film, but its moves combine hip hop dancing and sbujwa. That would be the latest form of South African street dancing, as of about a year ago. It evolved out of pantsula, the relatively old school style that Muzi’s late, disgraced father made his international reputation dancing. Spikiri toured America, but his involvement with drugs killed the legendary dancer shortly after his return. As a result, the high school student promised his domineering mother he would never dance like his father. However, Muzi has his father’s feet and they will not be denied indefinitely in Scottnes L. Smith’s Hear Me Move (trailer here), which screens during the 2015 African Diaspora International Film Festival in New York.

Muzi knows he is a dancer but he has never joined a crew, out of deference to his mother. As a solo performer, opportunities are limited, but he still has to deal with the challenges that come from being Spikiri’s son. However, his father’s old promoter “Shoes” recognizes his potential, inviting his to join the crew he manages, Sbujwa Nation. This does not sit well with some members, particularly their featured dancer Prince. In fact, Prince will soon leave to form his own upstart crew, Ambition.

As Muzi struggles to adapt to the demands of ensemble dancing, Shoes starts to level with him. There is indeed a reason why Prince so resents him. He is the illegitimate son Spikiri never acknowledged. Revelations like that mess with Muzi’s head, but Khanyi helps keep him sort of grounded. She might even be a potential romantic interest if Muzi can get his act together, but that is going to take a bit of time.

As dance movies go, Fidel Namisi’s screenplay makes Make Your Move and Born to Dance look like they were written by Paddy Chayefsky. Seriously, the business with old man Spikiri is just eye-rollingly melodramatic. However, the dancing is suitably dynamic and often very well framed by Smith, who almost always shows us the entire crew in full frame rather than self-defeating close-ups.

The cast is also appealingly young and energetic, particularly Bontle Modiselle, who makes a credible bid for movie stardom as the down-to-earth Khanyi. Mbuso Kgarebe also has the right sort of dangerous charisma for Prince, but the Nyaniso Dzedze just sort of survives as the excessively angst-ridden Muzi.

There is no denying the attractiveness of Hear Me Move’s cast and routines, but the Sbujwa-hip hop synthesis are not as distinctive as the wildly cool taiko drumming fusions choreographed by the awesome Yako Miyamoto for Make Your Move. Still, it has enough of a local spin to appeal to those who appreciate South African street dancing. Honestly, it is rather fun in a slightly cheesy way. Recommended accordingly for dance movie fans, Hear Me Move screens this Wednesday (12/9) at the Bow Tie Chelsea and Friday (12/11) at the MIST Harlem, as part of the special focus on South African cinema at this year’s ADIFF.

ADIFF ’15: Impunity

This fugitive couple is sort of like a South African version of Breathless’s Belmondo and Seberg, but the country’s thorny race relations and persistent corruption will further complicate their crime spree. Once they start, they might as well go all in. At least that is how the very white Echo and Derren see it in Jyoti Mistry’s Impunity (trailer here), which screens during the 2015 African Diaspora International Film Festival in New York.

Echo is not a nymph, but Derren is maybe slightly narcissistic. Nevertheless, they might have made a nice couple together. Unfortunately, before the waitress has a chance to accompany the waiting customer home after last call, she is sexually attacked by the bar’s sleazy owner. Derren helps Echo kill him before he can finish, at which point the die is cast. Despite the justification of their actions, neither Echo nor Derren considers the possibility of justice. Instead, they light off together, living in the moment as outlaw lovers.

Although their first killing was a case of self-defense, their subsequent crimes become increasingly problematic. Echo’s immediate codependency will lead to destabilizing fits of jealousy, not wholly unlike the kind that fueled Fabrice du Welz’s Alleluia. Both are also apparently irresistible to South Africa’s multitude of races. A case in point being the government minister’s daughter, who died a grisly death after propositioning Derren. Her murder will put Pretoria police fixer Dingande Fakude on their trail. Reluctantly, local Indian copper Naveed Khan will assist his investigation, even though he openly questions Fakude’s motives and intentions.

There is a reason why “slow down and start from the beginning” is such good advice for over-heated storytellers. Striving for artistic pretension, Mistry fractures her narrative timeline, but the cinematic results fall maddeningly flat. With little reason for each flashforward and backwards, exasperated viewers will wonder why on earth they are being shown these scenes, in this order. The periodic cutaways to surveillance footage of brutal unrelated crimes also feel like old hat and are not particularly germane to the film from a thematic standpoint. Such self-conscious busyness is a shame, because there is a kernel of something buried within the film.

In its depiction of systemic government corruption and still corrosive racial attitudes, Impunity might have been a more inclusive companion film to the J.M. Coetzee adaptation Disgrace. The evolving dynamic between Fakude and Khan is particularly engaging and ultimately rewarding. It provides a Dos Passos like survey of South African society, from privileged white gated communities to still marginalized townships. However, Mistry’s structural and stylistic gimmicks repeatedly take the audience out of the picture.

Nevertheless, Alex McGregor and Bjorn Steinbach deserve all kinds of credit for their fierce commitment as Echo and Derren, respectively. Their intensity helps sell their reckless slide into outright sociopathic behavior. Desmond Dube and Vaneshran Arumugam also develop terrific chemistry together, without overplaying the odd couple buddy cop refrain. There are some impressive performances buttressing Impunity, but editors Melissa Parry and Khalid Shamis apparently were not allowed to give it a more logical shape.

To its credit, Impunity does not let anyone off the hook. Some might therefore find it significant solely for its social criticism. As cinema, it is rather frustrating. Still, it is an interesting film to dissect and analyze. For patrons looking for a potentially divisive film to debate, Impunity screens this Sunday (12/6) at MIST Harlem and Monday (12/7) at the Bow Tie Chelsea, as part of the special focus on South African cinema at this year’s ADIFF.