Tuesday, September 8, 2009

Documentaries-Why Not Vice-Precedence?


Recently I was reading the paper, and came across a story about the controversy in the Black/African-American community about hair. Specifically-womens' hair. Specifically-Malia Obama's hair. While in Rome, Italy on vacation, 11 year old Malia Obama, the Presidents older daughter, wore her hair in twists. Conservative posters and commentators on the conservative blog Free Republic attacked her as looking inappropriate and unfit to represent the U.S. of A. Some posters used very racist terms including "ghetto whore" and other things I'd prefer not to think about. What kind of jerks attack an 11 year old girl for her hair? Anyway, this led to more focus from the mainstream media into a controversy that has been going on for generations in Americas black community.

For a long time, many black women have used chemical straighteners to give themselves long, silky straight hair, getting rid of their kinks and natural curls. Not only do these chemicals create a feeling on the heads of those using it of burning and itching at the same time, but they're expensive-leading to them being given the nickname "creamy crack." Many black women feel that its imperative to straighten their hair to look attractive and clean. Others feel that doing so is "selling out" and their natural curly and kinky hair is fine the way it is. Its a big deal in the community and stirs up heated arguments:

"For black women, you're damned if you do, damned if you don't," says Professor Ingrid Banks, an associate professor of Black Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara. "If you've got straight hair, you're pegged as selling out. If you don't straighten your hair, you're seen as not practicing appropriate grooming practices". She even wrote a book about the subject titled "Hair Matters: Beauty, Power, and Black Women's Consciousness."

Many African-Americans are burned out about the argument asking "Why can't hair just be hair?" Well, the most successful black comedian of all time has decided to answer the question. Chris Rock has produced a documentary film titled "Good Hair" to delve into this controversy and explore how far some women go to straighten their hair into those straight smooth locks that have become the "standard"-from schoolgirls having their hair relaxed chemically to a teacher doing a weave costing $1000 in this economy.

What all this shows to me is, if a documentary film, a successful one at that-the film won a Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival-can be made about womens hair, why can't one be made about the Vice-Presidents of the United States? Also, why can't it be just as successful-if not even MORE so? I think it can. No, I know it can.

Lets be honest, the only reason this film was made was because Chris Rock who is a rich, talented, internationally known celebrity wanted to get it made.

Seriously, our film is full of fascinating characters-who actually are REAL people, funny and exciting true stories, has to do with how the government of the United States works, the American voting public, an interview with a genuine American Legend in Gore Vidal, and more. Why not us? I know that our film can be a success. I know people will really enjoy it. Everyone I have shown the trailer to, even people who don't really know much about or are even interested in history, have found this fascinating and entertaining. Because it IS.

We need your help fans. We don't have a Chris Rock giving us money to make our film. We don't even really have access to someone like that. We need good word of mouth, we need buzz, then we can attract someone like that to help us out. Please encourage your friends to become fans on Facebook, read and post here on the blog, watch and rate the trailer on YouTube, spread the word to the world. My next blog will go back to focusing on former VP Cheney and historical VP's and VP trivia. Thanks for your support.

1 comment:

  1. I read the above comment-and to be honest-while I am grateful Aron posted something, why couldn't he have said something about my film instead of ONLY posting something about his own film? I may check out his film-but to be honest, I'm kind of annoyed that he couldn't say ANYTHING about our film. Oh well, thanks for writing something Aron.

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