The diversity of the UK wasn’t on display at the recent BFI film festival. With government funding cuts hampering film development in the UK, what are the chances of this dire picture changing? Olu Alakija asks some awkward questions and offers some solutions.
As 2011 draws to a close, and with the film festival circuit winding down, it’s time to ask ourselves – how many of the films released this year could be described as Black British?
We could debate, for a while, how best to define a Black British film. But for the sake of argument I’ll just list a few that have either been written by, or directed by, Black Brits or feature Black British actors in lead roles: David is Dying, Anuvahood, Submarine, Everywhere and Nowhere, Attack the Block, Shame and Wuthering Heights.
Let’s go even further back and ask another question. How many films released this century could be described as Black British? It’s a Wonderful Afterlife, Kidulthood, Four Lions, Adulthood, Bride and Prejudice, Sus, The Infidel, Bullet Boy, West is West, Land Gold Women, Rolling with the Nines and Bend it like Beckham come to mind.
If we are honest, it’s a relatively small amount covering 11 years with only a few notable commercial successes. Why is this the case? Do we have the stories to tell? Check. Do we have the writers? Check. Do we have the directors? Yet another check. Do we have the actors? Double check. Do we have the producers? Hmm.
That last category is where we may be lacking. Many of you know that producers are the money people who secure the finance for films. Without producers nothing gets made. We have an enormous amount of creative talent within the Black British firmament, but without the financial backing that producers wield it is very difficult to believe the current situation will change without us understanding the business of filmmaking a lot more than we do now.
We need more producers in positions of power and influence from Black British backgrounds who are able to green light the scripts many of us pour our blood, sweat and tears over. We also need to look at creative ways to bring funding into Black British filmmaking from other industries, such as the “Dragon’s Den” approach. Perhaps some film purists won’t be too happy with that suggestion but this is a business, and investment is crucial in any business.
If you have written the greatest screenplay in the world it may well remain the greatest screenplay ever written, but it will never become the greatest film in the world unless you secure investment for the project.
How do we change this? One of the main tasks is to build platforms and relationships. This will help to change the current situation of neglect in the Black British filmmaking community that has seen many of our brightest acting talents such as Eamonn Walker, Marianne Jean–Baptiste, Naveen Andrews, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, Parminder Nagra, Idris Elba, Sophie Okonedo, Lennie James, Naomi Harris and Aml Ameen head Stateside due to a lack of leading roles in this country.
At Undiscovered, Words of Colour’s script assessment and writing advice service, we aim to support new talent and unheard voices. We hope that you will join our mission to help change the film industry’s status quo so that come 2021 we can look back at a plethora of films from Black British filmmakers. We want to be in a position to say that we helped lay the foundations for a legacy that builds upon the heritage of pioneering Black British filmmakers from the last century, including Horace Ové, Hanif Kureishi and Menelik Shabazz. An ambition that we are sadly still struggling to achieve.
Olu Alakija is Words of Colour’s creative programmes manager for Undiscovered.