Secondly, I can’t help but wonder if any Cameroonian or Nigerian actors have taken any acting classes because I do not understand how one industry can continuously make bad movies with the same bad actors. Do their actors study the scenes or consider the emotionality required to convey them? Do they take voice classes? Do they practice improvisation and body movements? What acting techniques are they familiar with? Method Acting? Meisner Technique? Uta Hagen? Have they read a play by Cameroon’s Bate Bessong or Joyce Ashutangtang? Do they perform in theater? How do they perfect their craft?
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Lastly, all the shortcomings of this movie should be placed on the director. His scenes do not centralize their subjects enough, his cinematographer has a shaky hand, and he should have done a critical analysis of the script he was using. Instead, he put together a patch work of poorly shot and acted scenes and had the effrontery to submit this macedoine of mediocrity for Oscar consideration.
To me, it almost seems as if he and his alliance of artists are more dedicated to the glamor of being in a film than to the art of filmmaking. For these reasons, TFD fails in its artistic mandate.. In my opinion, high schoolers with iPhones have made better movies.
If Kang Quintus had not submitted The Fisherman’s Diary movie for Oscar consideration, I would’ve sheathed my pen because the Cameroonian and Nollywood film industry is relatively young with so much to learn. Be that as it may, Quintus’ submission suggests his film should be compared to greats. Tsotsi, Viva Riva, Beasts of No Nation, and Night of Kings are examples of African films that earn the right to this comparison. The Fisherman’s Diary, sadly does not.
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Nigeria and Cameroon are bastions of African art. As someone who has been shaped by African Literature, I find it astounding filmmakers can’t pick up Arrow of God by Chinua Achebe or Behold the Dreamers by Imbolo Mbue, or at least, read and watch Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Half a Yellow Sun to understand how scene-flow, character development, and dialogue work.
Even better, how come no one is borrowing from the writings and techniques of Bate Bessong, as well as many other African writers, to create movies rich with African eloquence?
I think our abandonment of these literary riches suggests a form of self-hate, one that finds it necessary to cloak an African story with the hems of Malala Yousafzai robes, rather than tell how the odious machinations of patriarchy manifest in Cameroon. In this respect, TFD, relies more on phantasm than Cameroonian realism.
This lack of authenticity is our great undoing. Till our artists sink into the meaning of our stories and push past the limits of their artistic capabilities, Cameroonian and Nollywood movies will continue to bask on the beach of artistic atrophy. If our artists are not willing to explore the depths of YouTube and the internet for directorial, cinematic, and acting insight, their movies will never compete globally.
Ultimately, our films will never be as good as they could be and we will be cursed to saying, “Not bad for a Cameroonian/Nollywood film,” every time we leave the movie theatre.
I’d rather leave a Cameroonian and Nollywood film saying, “This is the one of best movies I’ve ever seen.” I gloriously await that day.
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Sources:
Nwenfor, Esono.“Fisherman’s Diary puts Cameroon on Global map with Oscar representation.” panafricanvisions.com. Jan 11 2021. https://panafricanvisions.com/2021/01/fishermans-diary-puts-cameroon-film-industry-on-global-map-with-oscars-representation/
About The Author:
Kangen “YASSAY” Masango is a Cameroonian American writer, a veteran of the U.S Army, and a graduate student at Bowling Green State University in Ohio. His writings focus on Afrocentricism, Patriotic Criticism, Poetry, Arts, Music, and Culture. He’s been published in the Fitchburg Sentinel, Route 2, and Malarkey Books.
