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- Title
Vieyra's Vision of Cinema on the Verge of Independences.
- Authors
Goerg, Odile
- Abstract
Paulin Soumanou Vieyra is a multifaceted persona: filmmaker and producer, but also theoretician, film critic, and historian. The involvement of Paulin S. Vieyra, who graduated from the Parisian Film Institute (IDHEC) in 1955, in the debates on cinema's political stakes around Independence is the topic of this article. Cinema was a big success in African cities as well as in the countryside, each time an entrepreneur came around with a mobile cinema. The movies came from the Western world, mostly the United States, but also from India or Egypt, in a smaller proportion but with a highly symbolical significance; they were mainly action movies, westerns but also romances or musicals. In the 1950s at a time when activism for Independence was growing, the first elected Africans, or members of the educated elite, were concerned about the values present in these foreign movies, which they considered as being incompatible with African cultures and generally having a bad influence. They worried especially about their impact on the youth, mainly young men who formed most of the audience. Some intellectuals joined them in their critique while having a different discourse on cinema. They valued it as an educational medium and favored the production of African movies. These, they felt, should play a role as tools to shape citizens and to build the nation, in a pan-African perspective. They must also offer elements of moral and political thinking and serve as a mirror, a means of self-representation, for the spectators. Paulin Soumanou Vieyra participated actively in these debates through articles published in Présence Africaine or contributions at conferences such as the International symposium on "Cinema and Africa South of the Sahara," organized at the Brussels World Fair in 1958. There, discussions centered on the role of cinema in the political awareness of the (soon to be) citizens and the responsibility of filmmakers in the new Africa. This article aims to scrutinize Vieyra's thoughts and role in this context.
- Subjects
WESTERN films; ACTION &; adventure films; WESTERN countries; FILM critics; TEACHING aids; VISION; ACTIVISM
- Publication
Black Camera: The New Series, 2022, Vol 13, Issue 2, p301
- ISSN
1536-3155
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.2979/blackcamera.13.2.17.