One question lingered in the back of my mind when I eventually got the chance to speak with groundbreaking musician Slick Rick:
The eye patch was missing.
Slick Since his early days performing with Doug E. Fresh’s Get Fresh Crew in the mid-1980s, Ricky Walters, whose given name is Ricky, has worn fashionable eye patches. Rick was blinded in his right eye as a child. One multicolored, diamond-encrusted version was put up for auction by Sotheby’s in 2020. However, he was lounging behind a pair of mirrored sunglasses when we encountered him on Saturday at the Martha’s Vineyard African American Film Festival, appearing more like a wealthy leisure man enjoying a summer in the playground of the Black bourgeoisie than a hip hop pirate.
He informed me backstage, “This, to me, feels like an upscale Black environment,” following my questioning of him in front of festivalgoers regarding his visual project, Victory, which is the movie adaptation of his first album in 26 years. “So, we came here to examine if our contributions are nourishing the premium black atmosphere. Perhaps this gave them a little inspiration and filled a small void in their souls, but I don’t want to get too wild out here, you know?”
Slick Rick didn’t have to be concerned. Even though the Saturday afternoon crowd was a little older and more refined than the club kids who first made his songs like “Children’s Story” and “La Di Da Di” signature hits, they still enjoyed Victory’s ambitious visuals and high-energy sounds, which combined creative music videos from the album’s songs into a single, lengthy, hallucinogenic movie.
Featuring busy pictures created by Nigerian director Meji Alabi, who worked on Beyonc’s Black is King video project, 7WallaceVictory was put together with movie star Idris Elba, who is also a DJ and published the album on his label. Built over dance music tracks Rick heard Elba spinning during a DJ set, the film’s wide graphics also dazzle, echoing his grandfather’s London living room for the song “Foreign” and plunging into a boisterous, impromptu underground club for the song “Cuz I’m Here.”
At one point in the film, he jokes, “I flipped being blind into a luxury brand,” to the audience’s muttering acknowledgement. I hoped that the screening and panel discussion would garner more attention so that more people could witness what Slick Rick and his team had created. This was a spectacular comeback to form for an elderly rap maestro.
This is the atmosphere during the 23rd-year-old Martha’s Vineyard African American Film Festival, or MVAAFF, which gives Black artists a platform to launch ambitious projects in the most inclusive setting imaginable. Some Black people have a particular place in their hearts for the Vineyard, which is a historic retreat and sanctuary for those who can afford it. The MVAAFF features artwork from artists who showcase a diverse range of photographs.
Michelle Obama, Spike Lee, and Jennifer Hudson will all be making appearances at the festival until August 9. Over the first couple days, seeing screenings and speaking with directors was like sorting through a fascinating array of ambitious Black-centered productions that few other festivals might acknowledge or support.
On the sidelines, critics like myself could moan about the narrative arc of a movie or the omitted scenes in a documentary. However, at a time when giving historically underrepresented voices a platform is criticized as reverse racism, DEI antics, or worse, the audience has largely grown to appreciate and support Black artists.
Over a few days, I came across a lot of interesting work: Eric Roberts portrays an elderly white guy who is suffering from guilt on his deathbed following an accident that claimed the life of a young Black father in the dramatic short Lost/Found. The Ebony Canal, a scathing documentary on the fight to reduce Black child mortality, including moving narration by Viola Davis.
And in the movie The Class Reunion, Lil Rel Howery was funny as a sour coach who became a high school principal. (Howery stated that he was filming a humorous adaptation of Morgan Freeman’s Joe Clark from the movie Lean on Me.)The film, which is a Black-centered version of The Breakfast Club and was written by co-star Barshea Lowery, centers on five graduates who unintentionally lock themselves in their former cafeteria during a ten-year reunion.
Lowery, who is from Gary, Indiana, which is where I was born, informed me that he made the movie as a response to all of the John Hughes movies that were set in the surrounding city of Chicago and had no Black characters. And as I watched his comedy-filled movie, which was set in a place where I had also grown up and included folks I knew, I experienced an instantaneous and fulfilling connection that went beyond what I experienced when I saw The Breakfast Club in a theater back in 1985.
I wondered whether this is how the majority of white folks feel when they see a normal Hollywood movie.
But when TV producer Mara Brock Akil showed the final episode of the first season of her Netflix series Forever to a standing room-only audience, I witnessed the greatest display of happiness at this year’s festival. Having been a part of the writing crew of Moesha in the mid-1990s, Akil, the creator of iconic Black-centered comedies including Girlfriends and The Game, has lived on the Vineyard for many years.
The teen love story Akil’s Foreverisa Black is partially based on the same-titled Judy Blume novel. Additionally, “The Vineyard,” the fifth episode, is set on the island and functions as a sort of love letter, showcasing the rhythms of a prosperous Black family who had been taking annual vacations there.
After concluding a Q&A session following the showing, Akil told the ecstatic crowd that she regarded this story as her own take on the beloved romantic movie The Blue Lagoon. “I felt like I was bringing the baby home and everybody thinks she is cute,” she remarked. “You know, when the crew arrived at the beginning of the episode’s filming, I thought, ‘Oh boy, did I mess up by bringing work to my place of rest?'” But then I recalled to make sure you tell the narrative of Martha’s Vineyard culture as well as Black culture.
Akil utilizes a phrase that Black people don’t typically use when discussing living conditions: relaxed, to describe her relationship to the island.
“Our ancestors are in this land we’ve created more safety and space for this place that we call home,” Akil stated. “In order for us to feel somewhat more at ease. And shouldn’t that be how home feels?
The fact that Netflix has chosen to renew Forever for a second season may also help Akil feel at ease. However, she admits that Hollywood and corporate America’s push against diversity and inclusion has made the industry more inhospitable to young Black creatives. She hopes her presence at the festival may inspire some of the aspiring filmmakers in the audience.
“[Corporations] are pulling back on spending and some people are going to automatically drop out of the business and once they get pushed out, it’s hard to get back in,” Akil stated. “That is an attack. All they’re doing is shifting the objectives and providing fewer resources. Therefore, I believe we need to change course and focus on creating a new community, which is what I want.”
The Martha’s Vineyard African American Film Festival, from what I observed, is a potent setting for cultivating such spirit.
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