This month’s Black Eye is focused on the creativity and accomplishments of 4 black filmmakers plying their art in Japan. Their theories on and paths to success vary and their stories are fascinating and inspiring. Here’s an excerpt:

“His latest, “Stay,” is centered around a recovering drug addict — a Japanese junkie seeking a modicum of forgiveness and trying to clean up his act in an effort to re-enter a society determined to hold his past against him.

A Japanese guy? I was surprised to hear that. Japanese filmmakers certainly tell Japanese stories. And white film makers tell predominately white stories. But who’s telling black stories? I was raised to believe that if we don’t define ourselves we’ll be defined by others, and thus far, at least media-wise, it’s been primarily the white media responsible for the definition of blackness on film.

And Lord knows they’ve been doing a bang-up job, haven’t they? Pimps, whores, pushers, junkies, clowns, criminals, slaves, chauffeurs, maids, magical Negroes, Sidney Poitier and Samuel L. Jackson pretty much sums up a century of white Hollywood-manufactured black images, with relative few exceptions. And the Japanese media hasn’t hesitated to embrace, embellish and recycle these images.

I said as much to Wharton-Rigby.”

Click Here For the rest of the story

Enjoy, and share!

Loco