Thread by @kyalbr, Alright. I’ve finally finished Screenplays of the African American Experience. (1991). Which [...]

Alright.

I’ve finally finished Screenplays of the African American Experience. (1991).

Which provides the scripts for some foundational films.

Ganja and Hess.
Killer of Sheep.
Losing Ground.
Illusions.
A Different Image.
and Sidewalk Stories.

Some thoughts.

Bill Gunn was an incredible writer.

He’s able to do insane tension, delicious banter between the sexes, and long passages of estoericism.

I kept thinking about Phantom Thread while reading.

This psychosexual communion between lovers.

Next, and as said before, you can easily prove Hollywood’s historic racism just by pointing at the fact Marlene Clark isn’t known.

She (Ganja) is telling Hess about the day she came home to her mom, after a snowball fight with neighborhood kids.

Bill Gunn’s writing.

Next, Charles Burnett’s extreme minimalism.

Every iconic scene is so understated on the page.

Literally.

“Looking up between apartments, kids are jumping across. The camera pans down to show Gene and Stan drive up.”

That’s literally it.

But, it blooms in his hands.

Also, I’m unsure if I missed this, or if it occurred to me and I just forgot.

But, one of the early scenes in Killer of Sheep is a bunch of rowdy Black boys play-fighting by some train tracks.

Youthful machismo.

Then, 40 years later.

Kathleen’s writing in Losing Ground is so good and so philosophical.

I think that’s an important point because black people, black women, were (and are) writing films that probe existential questions as much as the next Kaufman or Malick.

Last thought, for now.

I think the introductions are also really amazing.

For example, Charles Lane.

Imagine premiering a film at Cannes, it being lauded as the most popular film of the festival, receiving a prolonged ovation.

Then, struggling to make more films.

Back to Burnett’s minimalism.

It’s just extreme precision and then he moves on, because he’s the director and knows what he means.

“Stan and his wife are dancing; she is trying to get him to respond to her but he seems like he’s in another world, a world of no feelings.”

I should add two things.

My absolute adoration for Julie Dash’s Illusions.

https://twitter.com/kyalbr/status/1257303433989591041?s=21 https://twitter.com/kyalbr/status/1257303433989591041

https://twitter.com/kyalbr/status/1257303433989591041?s=21

And, as hard as I tried,

I couldn’t find Alile Sharon Larkin’s film, A Different Image (1982).

Hoping to be loved for more than just her physical attributes, a woman cultivates a relationship with a male co-worker.