Community Media - Interactive World

Film Review: London River (2009) It was an aesthetic delight to experience the work of Sotigui Kouyaté in his highly engaging last film London River (2009) which won him a ‘Silver Bear’ at the Berlinale Filmfestival . Interviewed in 2001 he explained how he felt about his roles as an African and a storyteller: Let’s be modest. Africa is vast, and it would be pretentious to speak in its name. I’m fighting the battle with words because I’m a storyteller, a griot. Rightly or wrongly, they call us masters of the spoken word. Our duty is to encourage the West to appreciate Africa more. It’s also true that many Africans don’t really know their own continent. And if you forget your culture, you lose sight of yourself. It is said that “the day you no longer know where you’re going, just remember where you came from.” Our strength lies in our culture. Everything I do as a storyteller, a griot, stems from this rooting and openness. Sotigui Kouyaté was a Malinese actor and storyteller w...

Having worked as Director of the International Community Film Forum since 2006, I’m delighted to be serving as one of the Film Editors with the Postcolonial Networks website. We would welcome posts on a variety of topics - from film reviewers and critics, to amateur and professional film makers. The posts from members are an opportunity to share your creativity; to stimulate new conversations and to foster critical dialogues. As a reviewer you might be interested in offering a subversive or experimental reading of mainstream blockbuster films. Perhaps you want to produce a cross-cultural reading that the intended spectator may not have experienced. You may have relevant personal experience that challenges the tired stereotypes that populate our screens. It would be inspiring to read appreciations of film work that has a spiritual dimension; that promote greater understanding between faiths; or that explore the relationships between the material conditions of being and the associated...

The Spectre of Community Rebranded as the Big Society, notions of citizenship and community are back in fashion. To borrow and adapt Marx’s Manifesto (1848), the spectre of the community (not communism) is stalking contemporary society. For some commentators it is feared that an army of community organizers are poised for subversive warfare. Alternatively, the force is an awkward spectre awakened from the vestiges of a tired capitalist system. That’s one side of the argument. The other is that a nostalgic return to the community spirit is just a cover for cuts to public services. Furthermore, there are no plans to limit or democratize corporate economic power, or the private enterprise and management structures. Isn't Big Society linked to less global corporate power? Can a big Society really be forged by simply adding together thousands of local activities? The semantic force of community is oddly resurgent , even as we begin to trace its loss: the familiar lament for lost idea...

In low budget and community film making a lot of attention is paid to the participatory process and less to what creates an imaginative product worthy of a wider public. But I believe that creativity and quality are essential. Experience shows that there’s some core advice that could help you to produce a high impact and engaging product.  With that in mind I’ve produced a short list of tips from my project notebooks. in order to help you to create an award-winning short film.  If you have any other tips and advice or stories, why not share your experiences? We followed a 40 20 40 'Guide' for project time and resources: 40% Pre-Production planning / 20% Production Filming / 40% Post-production - editing, reflecting, promoting, screening We are close to the life of the people involved (by us, for us / inside out) We have a lively sense of where we live: place, environment, or locality = our grassroots, our heritage, our futures ...

1. Postfilm is FREE. We are already bombarded by moving images, simulations and surveillance. We resist merely by volunteering our time and our dedication. We subscribe to Creative Commons. No restriction or ownership, please. 2. Postfilm is COMMUNITIES. Working with others we begin to disrupt a mono-cultural “Industry” that serves limited interests and false commercial tastes. By linking with other postfilm communities we combat shallow and deluded capitalist interest groups. 3. Postfilm is OPEN. We will not be asked to produce qualifications or college certificates; or guild, union, association, industry, or any other exclusive membership card. If you have one, throw it away. 4. Postfilm is a range of Co-OPPORTUNITIES for us to think outside the Box (Office) 5. Postfilm is an act of LOVE. We are enriched by a love for what we do and how we share it. 6. Postfilm welcomes MULTI-MEDIA, and TRANSMEDIA. We resist the strait-jackets of specialisation and creative alienation. We play, we...

Thanks to everyone who has taken part so far for a lively and informed debate. There are as many points of view as there are contributors, but perhaps some common themes are emerging For clarification, I'd offer several points: 'Future': are we thinking about what we will be seeing in 3 years' time or 5, or 10 ? What aspect of the future are we thinking about? The history of 'film' accommodates and demonstrates swift and revolutionary changes, e.g. technological such as sound and hand-held cameras, digital etc educational: skills and training (non-) commercial structures distribution systems and platforms creating new markets, niches, tastes, (sub)genres etc There is no reason to assume that the pace of change has stopped or is slowing, what will we see next? How are we defining 'film' ? Who will be making 'films' and what will they be making? What will 'making' mean? For instance, will the market in moving image be much more domina...

Saul Alinsky's 1971 book, Rules for Radicals has been cited recently as an influential source for David Cameron's campaign for a Big Society. The main themes are the importance of citizens as participants and opportunities for re-engagement and re-empowerment. If you're already questioning why the Conservative manifesto employed a guiding quotation from that book, you're not alone. One alarmed commentators was Gerald Warner, writing in the Daily Telegraph on April Fools' day 2010: "David Cameron's Big Society is a grotesque fantasy inspired by leftist subversive Saul Alinsky" "Yet the Conservative Party blurts out this admission in the launch document of Big Society. There is a pedantic debate over whether Alinsky was technically a Marxist, or by-passed Marx as old-hat. What is beyond question is his project to overthrow capitalist society and to do so through infiltration of political parties, institutions and, above all, by the use of “communi...