Page 14 - aruba-today-20201119

a14 people & arts
Thursday 19 November 2020

In McQueen's 'Small Axe,' an epic of West Indian heritage

By JAKE COYLE this who's that. We're all this
AP Film Writer community in one beauti-
NEW YORK (AP) — For Steve ful party. It was all about
McQueen, bringing back energy."
the London of his childhood In a way, "Small Axe" has
began with remembering also carved out a space
the scents of his youth. for itself in an industry tra-
In "Small Axe," McQueen's ditionally inhospitable to
ambitious five-film anthol- such stories. After filming
ogy about London's West the anthology (McQueen
Indian community, the "12 completed most shooting
Years a Slave" director res- before the pandemic ar-
urrects the British capital in rived), the director penned
the decades before its mul- an op-ed describing the
ticultural present, tracing overwhelming whiteness of
the Caribbean immigrant film sets in Britain. "It's blind-
experience through the ingly, obviously wrong.
racism of the '60s, '70s, and It's blatant racism. Fact. I
'80s in order to illuminate grew up with it," wrote Mc-
the injustices of today. It's Queen.
a cycle, operatic in scope, "You just want the space
with movements of resis- to express yourself in the
tance, oppression, protest, same way as everyone
family and celebration. But This image released by Amazon Prime Video shows Letitia Wright as Altheia Jones-LeCointe, else, and the capital to do
its textures are precise and, center left, and Malachi Kirby as Darcus Howe, with megaphone, in a scene from "Mangrove." so," he says. "When I made
often, personal. time the strength to look at dramatizes the police ha- from memories of his own '12 Years a Slave,' people
The second of the five films, myself or that world. It was rassment of the Mangrove, upbringing, focusing on the said to me it was impossible
the rapturous "Lovers Rock," so close to me. It was a part a Caribbean restaurant drastically different spaces because they didn't think
captures a 1980 Blues Par- of me," McQueen said in a owned by Crichlow in Lon- Black people are forced to that movie would travel
ty — underground, impro- recent interview by phone don's Notting Hill district navigate. "Lovers Rock" is abroad. Well, it made a
vised dance parties with from London. "It was trying and an epicenter for the set almost entirely within the lot of money abroad and
thumping dub reggae held to understand who and Black community in the late house party, but a walk just it changed a lot of things
in homes since nightclubs what I am and where I '60s. A string of incidents led down the sidewalk brings a in Hollywood. So it's about
were typically closed to come from." to a trial resulting in the first reminder of the racist real- giving people the oppor-
nonwhites. McQueen, 51, McQueen, born in West judicial acknowledgement ity lurking all around. But in- tunity to make work -- not
was too young for those London to Grenadian of institutional racism in the side, it's joyous. giving. We'll take it, actu-
parties. But he remembers and Trinidadian parents, police force. "I was born into this, but it ally. We'll just take it."
how, during sleepovers at has previously made films "She's telling me about this was juxtaposed with the While in post-production
his grandmother's, his uncle about Irish protest ("Hun- and my Spidey senses are world outside. The world this summer, McQueen's
would leave a back door ger"), sex addiction in New going off. It's an amaz- outside was not like the project took on even
unlocked so his aunt Molly York ("Shame") and an all- ing story. But I'm thinking, world inside," says New- greater resonance with
could sneak out to them. female heist in Chicago ( 'When is that ever going to land, recalling a visiting the death of George Floyd
"Through smell, so much "Widows" ). But "Small Axe" get made? Who is ever go- white friend eyeing his fam- and others, and the subse-
memory came back to me. is his first production in his ing to care enough for that ily's curry goat. "I had to quent worldwide protests
Obviously, I was of a cer- native Britain. The project to get done?'" says Parkes. learn, 'Oh, this is not what — including one in London
tain age," says McQueen. swelled, he says, because "It took someone like Steve everyone else does.'" attended by John Boyega,
"I'd end up sleeping in a in looking for a story about McQueen to show up." Amarah-Jae St. Aubyn, star of the third "Small Axe"
bed with coats piled on top the Black experience in Lon- "Mangrove" takes the one of several young ac- film, "Red White and Blue,"
of me when I woke up." don, he found a multitude. shape of a courtroom tors who breakout in "Small a father-son tale in which
The first film of "Small Axe," The terrain, overlooked by drama but it proceeds less Axe," drew from her own Boyega plays a rookie po-
"Mangrove," begins stream- history books and popular like a Hollywood-style civil- family history in playing a lice officer.
ing on Amazon Prime culture alike, was rich. The rights campaign than as party-goer in "Lovers Rock" McQueen, who dedicated
Video on Friday. (It has al- films, themselves, became a furious response to be- who sneaks out to the Blues the films to Floyd, began
ready begun airing on the a collective; the title refer- ing unjustifiably set upon. much like McQueen's aunt thinking of the anthology
BBC in Britain.) Several of ences a West African prov- Parkes' Crichlow wasn't try- did. Her father was a reg- as science fiction — mov-
the films had been set to erb popularized by Bob ing to be a martyr. gae musician — she grew ies not just about the past
premiere at the Cannes Marley: "If you are the big "I needed to remember up with the music — but she and present, but about the
Film Festival but they in- tree/ We are the small axe/ that this is not a political needed to learn the dance future. q
stead first unspooled virtu- Ready to cut you down." rant. This is a heartfelt story moves of an earlier gener-
ally and at drive-ins during Taken together, "Small Axe" about a man who wanted ation. During rehearsal, she Solution Sudoku
the New York Film Festival stitches together a little- to cook rice and beans," noticed her dad's picture
where they were received known history, both inti- says Parkes. "That's all he on the wall. The shoot, with
with raves. McQueen be- mate and sweeping, that wanted to do." music piped in, was even
gan working on the anthol- had previously lingered on McQueen relied initially on more transportive.
ogy 11 years ago, before the margins and in fam- a TV-style writers' room for "When we were filming, I
the best picture-winning ily folklore. Shaun Parkes, brainstorming, eventually felt like it was an escape
"12 Years a Slave," initially who plays Frank Crichlow pairing off to write each being in that house. It was
imagining it as a TV series. in "Mangrove," first heard film with either Courttia like the outside world didn't
"I didn't know exactly what about his character while Newland or Alastair Sid- matter," says St. Aubyn. "Ev-
it was going to be and, to working ten years ago dons. Newland, an author eryone was equal, on the
be honest, I don't think I with Crichlow's daughter, of Jamaican and Bajan same level. It doesn't mat-
had the maturity or at that Lenora, an actor. The film heritage, likewise pulled ter who's the lead, who's Puzzle on Page 13