A Niche of Film Audience in Tanzania

During one of the latest film stakeholder’s discussion on Tanzanian films held at BASATA (Jukwaa la Sanaa) that I attended, Prof. Amandina Lihamba, while giving her closing remarks, she retains that  from her experience in arts “Audiences in arts is created, and thereafter they themselves creates hopes and expectations in such arts”. This argument contented my conscience and I decided to dissect it and see how it can be implied in our context of film art and industry and further loom into its dynamism in terms of film production, distribution and exhibition and so is its prospects. If audience can be created, I have a feeling that it’s high time we start doing the same with our film audience. My concern, over the past articles that I wrote and research I have conducted is that audience are the cause of the dynamism that is taking place in Tanzania film. In the recent research dissertation that I submitted to the University of Dar es Salaam, The changing dynamics in Tanzania film Industry, A study of Dar es Salaam film Audience, the study reveals that the dynamism that is taking place in Tanzania film industry at both levels of operations, that of production, distribution and exhibition is caused also by the audience’s choice of film that they watch.  My further reaches in this article is that these groups of people that make the recently locally produced films their choice have been created.

It’s very comprehensive to analyze and speak about ways that Tanzania film audiences have been responding to films that are locally made or imported over the years of history of cinema and movies since the times of BEKE before I even speak of how they have been created or how they can be created. One of the question before that might be, have they been responding to the sense that these films maintains, is it all about the visual or aural astonishment, or the beauty of films? Whatever the case that might have informed their response, I propose that what has been important in this variety of films to them as audience is the phenomenal meaning, expectations and the hypotheses that they supply to these films. Therefore what they choose to watch is informed by their certainty of meaning and expectations.

 Further into that we may ask, is it the audience’s meaning and expectation that precedes the film or the film is the one that audience chooses to watch and thereafter creates the meaning and expectations and hence the repeated viewing of the same film or rather films that fall under the same genre. Hereafter is it the question of genre or significance of the film to the audience?  Consider the film audience who reads about the film’s plot or storyline from the back of the film cover or through any other access such as reviews on internet, this sort of audience has certain expectations that he/she is digging from the film. This is where my argument lies, that if it’s the authors of the films that create the phenomenology of film viewership and so they create the audiences for their films.

Films are made to be seen. Therefore audience plays an imperative role.  With our locally made films some of the stakeholder hosts that we have lost track of what our films are or should be.  My view is that we are lost if we criticize these films with no records or researched information of what Tanzania film audiences are. What could be their psychology and attitude towards different genres of films that occurs in the history of human development? The fact that film audiences are of complex groups and are in diversity that it takes a lot of consumers/audience research to detail them park another challenge if we are to understand such process of audience procreations towards their films viewership interest and attitudes.

The breeding of Tanzania film audience that I am proposing here starts with the film author’s understanding of the fact that human beings differ in million numbers of ways. The human basic needs and desires towards films vary correspondently. Some chose to watch thriller, some romantic comedy while other will sit for hours watching horrors. Other than that some would chose to watch a film basing on a number of appealing factors such as language, commercial motives, its complexity or simplicity. To conjure what the films is about takes brain muscles. To make a film that demands such muscles takes an author of the same quality. In turn, at the end of the circle it’s the audience who chooses among the pool of different levels of brain - demanding films. Whatsoever it’s the author who initiates the process and once the film is out his authority deplete and he can not tell where his influences ends.

This is the point that I get to realize that we can create a new group of film audience in Tanzania. This starts with identifying and being inspired by matters that informs their consent with different varieties of films found in Tanzania film market and exhibition. What’s important is that we create them to become audiences to our films and we don’t necessarily create what they want. As said above by Prof. Amandina that “Audiences in arts is created, and thereafter they themselves creates hopes and expectations in such arts”.  To create films for them is more or less that you are arguing for them or with them or you are making a statement about the situations and circumstances that surround their lives. This puts us on the verge of contempt again as it demands that we (authors) are well informed and we do understand our society well enough to analyze their situations and the internal and external drives to such. Shall we get that information to our finger tips? How? Let’s read. So much has been written already, it’s upon us to adopt and only to adopt them to screen plays. 

The film audience’s responses may reflect various influences and may act symptomatic of the society in which the film was made. I hope that fact provides us with an understanding as to why no matter what is so critically – what is not film in our locally made films they still enjoy distribution all over the film market in Tanzania and the nearby countries. The images and ways of life of post modern society are being reflected or portrayed in these films with very little or no commentary or statements to speak of the philosophy or socio – psychology of the same in the contemporary world.

Our films should have clear objectives which in some what reason can be to bring hope to the now riveted and history of struggle of the Africans against poverty, hunger, famine, war, ignorance to mention a few. I presume there are film audiences in Tanzania who would enjoy watching Xala, Yomba Yomba, Harusi ya Marium, Neria, Fimbo ya Baba, Mama Tumaini, Rama, to mention a few, its only that these films have limited distribution and are mostly exhibited during festivals where by very few attends them and need I mention also some would prefer to watch films in the confinements of their homes. Such being the case we can replicate from what these films are, probably in every aspect and make films of the same style or conventions and continue on such direction to find our own course, niche or place in the world’s film market. In each and every film I sighted above one is able to find a commercial motives being rendered apparently with the life – philosophy motives or fine art motives. This is the tendency in Hollywood, Bollywood, Nigerian films and so forth. I trust that such films as mentioned above would have enjoyed a wide market distribution if they were made to be distributed for profit or whatsoever. One thing that inspires such a conviction in me is that audiences are also wide and complex enough to find out what they would have chose to watch. They eat what you serve but they have a mandate over what class of service you are providing them. Hence we can speak of the possibility of creating another niche, with a different kind of service and possibly make another group of film audience to support it as they bring their expectations, phenomenal meaning, hypotheses and thereafter causing the dynamism to our growing film industry in Tanzania.

The Maisha Lab in Uganda put it as their motto that if we don’t tell our stories who will, the stories of the hunt will always favor the hunter until the story of the hunt is told by the lion, an African proverb infers. Rambo wins the Vietnam War for the American but we all know what happened during such war.

Brainwaves and Insights from the 13th ZIFF Winning Films Directors

At least every year over the past 13 years, Zanzibar has been hosting the famous Zanzibar International Film Festival. Over the years I have been attending such an important festival for both film audience from around the world and most importantly film directors from dhow countries and globe at large. Well I couldn’t help it doing so this time around as well. Reading the ZIFF program, my first glance was on the message from this festival director, Prof. Martin Mhando. Some of it reads “At ZIFF we act as a vehicle for art and the union of image and sound in film is one of the most powerful art forms we have today. We provide a space to show the amazing, beautiful and stimulating works from Africa and beyond so they can be honored and be given the due time and reflection they deserve”.  That’s exactly what the 13^th ZIFF screened films were, they were amazing and beautiful to watch and stimulated both the souls and minds of the film audience who were gathered to watch them. During ZIFF such films do walk away with awards and prizes and people who collected them are the directors of the films. Their happiness and appreciations didn’t end up when they were receiving their symbols of winning but the day after they were invited for a press conference and this is where I collected from them what I call brainwaves and insights about filmmaking but most noticeably why and how should we be making films.

The following is the presentation, with a little bit of commentary added, of the ZIFF after awards night press conference attended by some of the winning films directors. Starting with Ndoto za Elibidi (75min) by Nick Reding and Kamau Wa Ndugu that walked away with four awards from different awards categories. The film was devised originally as a stage play with actors from the Nairobi slums. This Swahili story pivots around the theme of acceptance and love as its colorful protagonists – parents, where by George has a dream of seeing his four daughters getting good jobs and prospering but the dream is becoming illusory as both members of the family and their lovers come to terms with HIV and ghetto life.

The directors were able to verify what the motives for their making of such a brilliant film were. According to Kamau Wa Ndugu, they were predictive that the film will bring hope to people living in slums (Madhare, Nairobi Kenya) as well as motivate them. Ndoto za Elibidi was running for five years in the slums (Under SAFE project) therefore it’s likely that they had about fiove years of pre – production.  One peculiar and innovatively far-fetched aspect about Ndoto za Elibidi is that audiences in the slums are introduced as third characters of the film and are therefore seen reacting to the play. However what is far more important one should is the moral statement of the film and the moral duty that the two directors were able to attend to.

A word of inspiration for younger and growing filmmakers that Nick Reding was able to give was that it’s not easy to make films, just persevere and keep going, we have seen really interesting and good young filmmakers here and I think there are a lot of talents in East Africa. Mean while Kamau Wa Ndugu had this words …patient pays, we have been very patient with this film, we have been wanting to shoot for the last five years but we didn’t have any money and we decided to just wait and finally we have a film.

Motherland (118 min) by Owen Alik Shahadah,walked away with an award for a best documentary film is a bold, epic documentary that fuses history, culture and politics to tell a new dynamic story of a continent. This fascinating narrative unfolds with interviews from Meles Zenawi, Jacob Zuma, Ali Mazuri and Harry Belafonte.  According to Owen Alik (Producer/Director) “Motherland is a concise overview of thirty thousand years of African history, starting with our first civilization in the Nile Valley, Ancient Egypt and charting the course of African history which is slavery, colonization and so forth to the contemporary moment dealing with the issues that continent face, success stories in the African continent.  Well motherland is actually about “the motherland” which is Africa to most of the blacks living in the different parts of the world, said Owen Alik. The film is a very intellectual vigorous film telling a story that demands a lot of research and objectivity.  However Owen Alik succeeded to a greater percentage to draw the attention and feelings of the diversified ZIFF audience who had an opportunity to watch the film. Owen Alik agrees that it was easy for him since he is also a scholar in aspects of African history particularly the Arab slave trade, African holocaust and West Africa. “That’s my style, doing academic type of themes” Owen Alik maintained. However the film isn’t dry as one may think due to the fact that it treats the academic theme. The cinematographic aspect of the film creates a visual simulation that makes it appealing to the mind and the eye at the same level of impact.

Despite the bureaucracy over the archived – past information about different stories that we always arrest to be a set back towards the making of profound films with such stories as what “motherland” was able to comprehend, Owen Alik maintains that it was his previous works and the validity of his idea of the film that paved his way through the bureaucracy over the retrival of such archived materials in different archives around Africa. There was a point that people he met along the way were directing him where to go and what should be picked for this documentary film. Lastly Owen maintains that the best person to succeed is the one who prepares. Preparation constitute the bigger part of a production than the filming itself which becomes easy if you have prepared. Owen went on supposing that in the process of making Motherland he had to do a solid research “we sepnd a lot of time preparing for example for the academic part of the film, tones of research papers were visited, history of the Swahili coast, the Zanji in Iraq…it’s a glamour and it’s a lot of work.

My City on Fire (5 min) which was awarded a best short documentary film is a short documentary about the 10^th December 2009 – riots in Kampala. People were terrified and rush to their families but not Dennis Onen (Director of the film) who felt the urge to make a video about the riots and he is courageous enough to go out on the streets only to find his city on fire. “Whatever endeavors we are in, though some people may not see it, the rest of the world may see something potential on it that is what makes me strong and gave me the courage and I feel encouraged telling more of the story of African continent” said Dennis Onen.  My city on fire is an instinctive film as the director reacted to the situation in Uganda at the time when the Buganda Kingdom and the central government had a conflict that had reached a maximum point and resulted into a war. “I picked my small hand cam and I was like, I need this story, I need to record it, may be one day I will need it but when I went down the road to this (record) I discovered that it was not just a story I wanted to keep but this was a story to tell the rest of the world”. Dennis went on supposing that the main thing I considered was what story I wanted to tell the world; it’s not only the recording (that was coincidental) I made but the story is what inspired me to go on with the making of this film.

My city on fire is Dennis’s personal statement, having experienced seeing his city burning at some point in his life. Dennis agrees that there are facts in our “motherland” that needs to be exposed. Finally Dennis expounds that he is in line with documentary films and he might continue making them and hence he wants to be nicknamed Dennis “The documentarian”, best of luck brother as such is an endeavor.

Pumzi (21 mins) is a science – fiction made in response to the problems we have with water especially the water crisis in Kenya and I reaction to the bottled water. According to the director, Wanuri Kahiu, Pumzi is holding in check the idea behind bottled water as one of the reason that we privatize all our resources. The director believes that it takes more water to make the bottle than to put water in the bottle. Pumzi is also a response to the ill-care that we give to the environment. The film dictated what genre it was going to be, I just followed the story from the beginning to the end” said the Wanuri Kahiu. Thus she didn’t have the idea of what genre this film was going to be as she was initially writing it.

The film is approximately 35 thousands US dollar budget which in reality is hard to seize for a non – profit project but she managed and she didn’t hesitate to expand on the grounds of such expensive grant saying “the first short film that she already made created a portfolio for granters to be convinced that she is an established filmmaker that can stand for the making of a film from the beginning to the end. However she maintains that she is not a proponent of just making films with grants money “I guess that’s not helping the industry in performing and growing, if you are not necessarily accountable on how that money goes into the industry in the end. She went on supposing that it will be great if we could get more of the commercial world, private sections investments to be able to fund films and get a little more government support. She lastly maintains that with every filmmaker, you are only as good as your last film.

Therefore, if I garner from such brainwaves and insights of the 13^th ZIFF film directors, I would say the reason why we should be making films is that film supposes a personal, moral and intellectual statement on and about the different life situations and circumstances that we live by on daily and from different wakes of life. It at all, we (filmmakers), on my opinion, we could think of films as text with statements to make, we might put this discipline high on top (than it has already been) of other disciplines that culminates on the same fact that “as we live, we come across the situations and circumstances that demands wisdom to go over them, we therefore need a statement of some meaningful actions of redemption”. Can we provide such statement via this medium, film?

  

Thy two opinions on a new trend of video – filmmaking in Tanzania

It’s highly a sense of departure from imperialism and consumption of the arguments/thesis that are conveyed to us about the world through this medium (film) whenever you find that we are now engaging on the making of films with our own hands and brains. I salute the braveness of the filmmakers who initially way us through the stage in development of Tanzania filmmaking industry where films that dominated the market were those imported from Hollywood, Bollywood, Nigeria and South Africa to mention a few. Recently the discussion on this trend has been revolving around the film’s form and structure, contexts and content, history and business. The centripetal force towards the current tendency of releasing half baked films on weekly basis has been the filmmakers themselves plus the monolithic enterprises. What is being wrapped or packaged in these films is originally the image of the Tanzanians. We are now being observed by the rest of the world via the satellite channels as African Magic on DSTV, the context that one may assume that it works to our advantage on the matter of promoting our local film products, is highly a context that loops us on the verge of disdain. However, the world will never be critical of the fact that we are still lugging off in the struggle to comprehend how films tell their stories in the sense of their formal structures but I conceive that they can be critical of the stories that we tell and who do we choose to tell those stories through. It’s upon the former and the later assertion that I will be deriving my two opinions.       

My first opinion should take into an account of what I prefer to call “the soul” of every film that is being made in this world, and this is simply “the story”. In short, the story constitutes a cause-effect relationship between characters, time and space. The story is by itself what makes a good film, apart from other elements and techniques that are employed during the writing of the screen play and later the making of it. To a greater extent the successful adaptation of a story to a screenplay will be the one that follows a certain standard narrative and dramatic flexible formula that has been agreed upon by the filmmakers themselves or rather what is being recommended by the audience. This is the stage in development of filmmaking that we haven’t reached yet, but what happens to the art of storytelling that is believed to have its origins in the diversity of Africans traditions, tale telling and performances? What happens to other sources that we can derive stories from apart from people, such as myths, history, and literature?  

My opinion here  is that we might fail to comprehend the intelligibility of using the electronic movie making technology, we might as well fail to comprehend the dramatic structures and master narratives that has informed the most successful and blockbusting films such as the classic Hollywood dramatic and narrative structure but we should not fail, even under any other circumstances, to tell stories that are compelling and stories that underscores the reality of the situations from our different but daily wakes of life. From early 1990’s Hollywood has produced a consistent style of filmmaking in terms of the narrative stories they tell and how they tell them dramatically, from 1960’s to present what have we produced via this medium? Rather I find that the situation is worsening up.

My second opinion is on whom we should use to hold together the different parts of the story that makes a whole film, in this matter the central characters or the protagonists in any film plays this significant role. What makes them characters is a set of traits such as wit and keen insights but then he/she needs to go through a series of adventures that are larger than life. It’s upon him/her that we see the story and the plot unfolding, through him or her we conjure the message that is being processed to us (audience). However, with our new trend of filmmaking, I doubt that we have been able to modify or forge our filmmaking practices towards this tendency. Briefly, films mechanically reproduce the culture of the people and no matter what happens in the film, the central focus of the film rests with the decisions and actions of a major character who wants to solve, escape or do something to reach a certain defined goal. Again if I draw examples from Hollywood films, you find that an active, goal oriented protagonist is at the center of the Hollywood version of storytelling often motivated by certain psychological traits whether to make the world safe or to complete the journey into the unknown. If a film begins with an enigma or problem that affects the life of the major character, I think we have enough problems to capitalize on; however my query will still be on “who is that major character” in our societies? What should we vest him/her with? Knowledge, courage, wit, wisdom? It’s time we wake up and command our intelligence towards this aspect.

Above are the two opinions that I may use to testify against the cases that we are challenged on the use of filmmaking technology towards the aesthetic of the filmmaking art, we are lacking investors who are willing to provide funds for the making of commercial films, we don’t know yet the significance of the titles we give to our films and so forth. Let’s find good stories to tell, stories that are credible, unified, interesting, simple and complex, stories that handles emotional materials with restraint and lets tell those stories through characters who hosts what is wit, moral, rational and keen about ourselves, our culture.  Nevertheless I wish to find stories whereby writers process a message to audience that brings hope in anything, any situation that they write for or against instead of just portraying what they call reality about Africa.

Facets of “Vimkandala” to Average Film Audience

Tanzania is the host of over forty million people. Approximately over 5 million people are expected to be movie fans regardless of their age, occupation, education level, race, regions that they are found and so forth. These audiences are fond of watching movies in the confinements of their homes, some go to cinema houses while there are many of those who go for local cinema huts famously known as “Vimkandala”. What attracts these audiences to these cinema huts is, among other factors, the fact that some, if not all, of the movies that are screened are movies that have been translated to Kiswahili language. Most of these movies are translated from their original languages but mostly the Indians and the English language movies. The group of people that are accustomed to this tendency is a group I hereby connote them as “average audience”. By average I mean audiences who have no competence in the language that is being used in a movie but they demand to watch the movie with different sorts of pleasure that they obtain from it.

The question of what language is being used in a movie for an audience to understand I believe is also a question of who is the target audience. In this information age or in this human project of living as if we are in one village, we are given access to whatever that appears to please us and appeals to our gratitude and pleasures with little hitches of difficulties. Some are aware of this and what they do is to choose what bears with their social-economic realities. However, within the same trend there are some of us that have failed to make such sorts of choices but rather they seem to look for anything that gives them pleasure regardless of the difficulties. The difficulty of language in foreign or rather imported movies to average Tanzanians is the typical case here.

Movie stories are said to unfold in two major aspects. One is that movies are 70% mimetic/showing us what the movie is all about while the remaining 30% is reserved to the diegetic/telling aspect of them. But however little the aspect of telling is, it plays vital role for audience to conjure what the movie is all about. This aspect of telling is the one that we listen to and cognize, hence language becomes the most important tool in this process of exchanging information from the authors of the movie to the audience. Henceforth, I parade herewith the incidences that we demand subtitles to movies that speaks a foreign language to us, therefore the subtitles should be in a language that we are at least competent with. However there are incidences that even the subtitles are termed to be unhelpful. Such incidences are for instance when you don’t understand even the language of the subtitles.

This is where we find the antecedence of “Vimkandala” or cinema houses in most of the highly populated areas in Dar es Salaam such as buguruni, Mbagala, Gongo la Mboto, Manzese, and so forth. The social composition of the population that is found in these areas is of such people who have certain sentiments of language incompetence of such language as English, let alone Indian.  As this average audience encounter difficulties on understanding the movies that are told in different language such as English movies and those in Indian they turn to this Vimkandala where by the movies that are screened are basically the translated ones from such languages to Kiswahili. If you happen to attend the screening sessions in “Vimkandala” you will find that it is not only the matter of translating, and this is exactly my concern, but also a matter of employing a new narrator to the story of the movie. A narrator here is employed as an omniscient narrator who is looking and explaining the events that are unfolding in the movie from outside. Need I mention also he seem, if you listen very carefully, to be the one who knows everything about what is happening in the movie.

My reservation here is that we are overlooking the unconstructive impact of such translations to many factors of development such as human intelligence. Movies not only that they appeal and involve the minds of the audience to conjure it contextually as well as content wise, but also they are good as brain teasers. They demand the use of brain for an audience to juggle with the plot of the movie story. This is one reason why film theorists have tried to categorize movies among the pedagogic institutions. However among the activities that denies movie such power is the act of translating them by imposing a third narrator who tells the story in a translation and from his point of view. This may cause serious problems to the audience who at this sort of phenomenology are denied the use of their intelligence to grasp what the film tries to propound but rather they are being oriented to it via this new third narrator. If audience is subjected to such phenomena repeatedly, I conceive that his/her thinking capacity is at stake and however helpful this has been to him/her; it shall reveal its cons in the following endeavors such as excelling in education palavers that calls for his ability to think.   

Finally, looking back to the old good days where we had storytelling sessions during evenings that were told to us by grandpas and grandmas, this should be a replica of such atmosphere, the only difference is that now we are seeing what is being told. The fact that we were not seeing what our grandpas and grandmas were telling us and it was upon each individual to visualize what he/she hears is one factor that I consider that tradition as part and parcel of nurturing human thinking faculties from childhood. In the contemporary Tanzania if you step into this “Vimkandala” you will find children of five to ten years concentrating on the screen to see just what they hear at the same time. E.g “anampiga teke pale”as in action movies. I suppose this is one of the negative facets of Vimkandala to average movie audience in Tanzania that the government and stakeholders should not continue to overlook them.

Is TAFF going to salvage the Tanzania Film Industry?

On the 1^st of December 2009, there was a meeting between two opposing parts though with the same interest, and that is the National Arts Council of Tanzania (BASATA) and Tanzania Film Federation (TAFF) as BASATA refuses to lend a registration to TAFF as a federation that shall oversee the state of affairs and progress of film industry in Tanzania. Again this created two groups of filmmakers within the same country, those who were in support of TAFF and those who teamed up with the BASATA.

The controversy went on for months later, but not until Saturday, September 18^th 2010, whereby TAFF was officially launched at Leaders Club. The inauguration process was fairly attended by most of the stakeholders, filmmakers, producers, analysts and critics and the government officials such as the BASATA General Secretary, Mr. Gonche Materego. The newly elected President of the federation, Mr. Simon Mwakifamba delivered a speech that outlined a number of opportunities, issues and challenges attached to the filmmaking industry and explained how TAFF is geared up to embark upon them.

As one of the attendee and the stakeholder, realizing  the atmosphere whereby when you look into the faces of many of us what you see is hope and determination, I kept asking myself is TAFF going to live up to people’s expectations, dreams and ambitions out of the Tanzanian Film Industry. What is it that they should revisit and provide a different framework, vision and deliverance? That’s when I realized that I do have few concerns.

First, It seems the industry isn’t doing very well as one might expect it to. Basing on the analysis and criticisms, it appears to me that we are lacking or we do have inactive supervisory boards over the different matters pertaining to this industry. To complicate the situation, BASATA, alone, is summoned to address those various issues. The incidence of TAFF into this industry comes at the moment that such sort of organization is probably highly needed. The industry needs a federation which if it is well defined; it is supposed to be a similarly organized union of societies, associations, trade unions etc in order to retain control of internal matters but some are left to be controlled by the government. That’s what to most extent; this federation is trying to embrace if one studies the nature of the organization of this federation whereby it contains within it the associations of scriptwriters, location managers, directors and so forth. Despite having these associations, the Tanzania film board, Copyright Society of Tanzania (COSOTA), Tanzania Film Censorship Board to mention a few should be awakened to the situation that is prevailing at the moment as far as filmmaking is concerned. And therefore TAFF should work hand in hand with these organs.

Secondly, TAFF is supposed to make sure that the monolithic enterprises rationalized as major Distribution Companies have their investments coincide with the demands of the production of the particular film. If at all the average cost of producing and marketing a Hollywood film is now more than $ 60 Million, on serious note, we shouldn’t be spending less than 30 Million throughout the process of making at least one movie. If we are spending 5 to ten million what is the profit then? If Tanzania is hosting over 40 million people whereby approximately one third are watching movies via whatever mechanism, the profit that is realized can be projected to overrun the production costs per millions.

Nevertheless the condition that to have your film distributed by these companies, the film should contain at least a popular star is a condition that is drifting the industry ashore. My observation is that if at all the story of the film entails the need of the different cast apart from the well known – popular stars who are being used as commercial motives,  then there should be a breach to such endeavor. The other side of the story means we are under utilizing the talents enclosed within our environment. During the launch, was the day that I witnessed a large group of people falling into different age categories turning up to such an event, needless I say that they all aspire to showcase their potentials in different aspects of filmmaking. These are untapped potentials, and the industry may not give room for them because of the colossal distributors and their requisites of business. There should be a remedy to this situation in the nearby future, and I suppose that TAFF is bearing this in mind.

If I continue the other keynote that can help navigate and polish a different impression as far the film industry in Tanzania is concerned is that of film authorship. Despite the fact that this is not a well understood aspect yet, but it is impacting in our industry. The author of a film is the director, in recent times everybody wants to become a director. The gurus who were there at the very beginning are still entertaining us with the same concepts and marks of their factual lives are to be observed in the films they are making even after eight to ten years. The fact that we lack trained, open minded and well informed directors who can determinedly oversee the productions of these locally made films is a fact that shall replenish the industry very soon. Nevertheless the directors are lacking original and critical ideas of their times. TAFF needs to create sorts of regulations to control whoever wants to join the industry as a director, if he or she is well vested to harmonize and ensemble elements that will make films with impacts in our context.

The following may annoy some of us, but it is one of the lethal weapons that we are holding without noticing their magnitude of destruction. This is none other than knowledge and level of education. The predisposition that art is talent and it doesn’t need a formal education is a homicide to the art industry in Tanzania. Film industry is also one of them. People who are engaged with the industry are not bothered not only to learn more and expand their horizons but also they are not bothered to read as a way that it can add up to their ability to comprehend different matters concerning film production. For instance, for actors to play a certain role means to be someone else, which means also that the director, should work hard with the actor to make sure that the actor becomes the person he/she is portraying. This process depends upon the actors readiness skills to understand what director is saying and how much he/she is able to throw the director’s ideas at the back of his/her brain. This is more or less like we are in a class and teacher is teaching, and to understand him you need to have a brain that can comprehend what is being said, the complexity keeps on changing as one excels through the world of academics. When it comes to the fact that most of the actors have only reached form four or less, it leaves a question on how they can grasp significantly what is being tailored for them by the screenwriter and the director there after for them to portray. Or the other question will be what the educational level of the directors is? Sorry I know this irritates, but we have to face it. The Kenyans and The Ugandans are coming, they are not PhDs type but they read! So shall we? TAFF promote the habit of reading to nurture our brains as artists.  

We are experiencing the cons and pros of digital technology especially in terms of piracy and illegal distribution of films over the internet. However, I am still perplexed that, will there be a moment that our film industry shall cross the threshold to experience a place in the global dimensions? If at all, according to media researchers, the American film industry collects more than 80% of the world’s film revenues although it produces only around 15% of the world’s films, is there a chance that we are going to make films that contributes some percentages in the remaining 85% of the world’s films or we shall end up contributing to that percentage at the local level only. This needs vision of both filmmakers in Tanzania and the stakeholders so is the responsible government organs.

The existing, emerging and newly established film production companies needs to be associated and have a common goal. There should be one formula/model designated to the making of their films that is embraced by both companies. Hollywood film industry has its own narrative – dramatic model dedicated to the making of their films. The model is tracked upon by major and minor studios of productions such as Paramount pictures, Sony pictures, Warner Bros, Disney, 20^th Century Fox, Universal, Dreamworks and many others to mention a few. Can we experience the same, now that we are associated under TAFF?

I always watch films to the last credit rolling up at the end of film so as to appreciate people who have played even a flat role or have contributed to the making of programs even as grips, and I have been doing the same to our locally made films. I am not satisfied with a number of names and the credits that are being given are not diverse enough to say that the film was produced sufficiently and effectively with a crew. What I usually see is the repetition of the same names to different responsibilities to production. TAFF please do something; let these people understand that filmmaking is crew – collaborative work that can take up to a 1000 people.

Lastly, and to conclude, There is also a need to demystify our systems of distributions and marketing windows. Recently we have witnessed a theatrical premier at century cinema of one the films made by Pilipili Entertainment. Nevertheless East Africa Television (EATV) has given a slot showing locally made films. There is a need to exploit the domestic theatrical releases unfolding not only in Dar es Salaam but also in other regions and the East Africa at large, let have an opportunity to get into DRC, Burundi, Rwanda, Kenya, Uganda etc before we  come back to duplicate copies for home media users.   

The discussion I pose above jog across issues that are recently hampering the industry. However with the Tanzania Film Federation (TAFF), I may be indebted to say we might be on our way to the newly – well organized world of professional filmmakers and their practices for the interests of the Tanzanian people engaged with it and the country at large.

New trend of video-filmmaking in Tanzania: “The question of Audiencehood”

I wish to continue my discussion on the new trend of video-filmmaking in Tanzania by further discuss the question of audience hood. If you are following closely this column, in the December edition I asked “who are the audience” that are patronizing this new trend of video-filmmaking in Tanzania? And I went to connote that they are embracing it, they are embracing whether what is produced or tailored for them to consume is good or bad, probably with the reason that they find the products as friendly as to their use, environment and identity.

But before I continue the discussion, it should be noted, first and foremost that the objective here is to try and understand this new trend from the perspective of the audience before other contributing factors to its susceptibility, emergency, and continuity and not to interfere with people’s sense of pleasure and patronage.

As for the case of the new trend of video-filmmaking, it is my conviction that the criticisms that have been provided hitherto will have no impact as to change the tendency of producing half baked, copy cats video films if we don’t take at least a step to understand the attitudes of the audience to whom these films are produced for and further more what regulates their attitude. And I here by raise another question in this edition, the question of audiencehood.

The question of audiencehood can be traced back to the early experiments of audience’s response to film by Bantu Educational Cinema Experiment (BECE) in 1930’s that was conducted by the British under Major L.A. Notcutt. For the first time in history the brains of the Tanzanians (Tanganyika by then) were put into test to see how they can conjure the plot or arrangement of events in a film in order to understand what the film is all about or trying to propound. Even though on the other side of the coin this was the act towards the British mission of civilizing Africans in their manners and ways of living, this is how far back I wish to begin the discussion on the question of audiencehood.

I suppose the reason to initiate such an experiment was based on the fact that film is the language in so much as it uses the cinematic codes, images, signs and conventions.  Briefly, we can say, there is a way that film speaks to its audiences or spectators. While watching film we happen to read what we see and I am of a view that that’s how film obtained a universal reach and appeal. No matter who or where we are found in this universe, we all can interpret or read what we see.  However our interpretation of what we read as we see demands knowledge, a shared experience and meaning between the communicator (in this case film author) and the audience. Therefore we arrive to a point where we realize that film as a system of communication with wider range of meanings; it demands a different mindset to understand it. Now a mindset is so abstract to define it, however one criterion that can be used is the attitude demonstrated by an individual towards different situations, life circumstances, objects of pleasure and so forth that demands his/her inner drives to act in particularly a different manner towards the same.

If I go straight to our case study “film” where by the state or conditions for a person to become the any genre of film audience or fan is based on his/her attitude towards the same, for example the audience who prefer horror films has a different attitude to them compared to the one who doesn’t.  However what regulates those attitudes is so subjective to provide a clear cut explanation, but I can speculate that we bring to the reception of a film our experiences of what the film is treating whether it’s a fiction or non fiction and take as a process message what the film will suggest at the end.

Watching the currently occurring commercial tailored films, some would argue that I don’t watch them because they are insulting my intelligence, but some would watch the same film to the moment where the credit starts to roll keenly, and you may consider him or her to repeat that viewing. What does that suppose? In the previous article, I conclude saying that different group of audiences, under go different experiences while watching the same film. I wish to add that these experiences are drawn from the different moments they have undergone in the past; in this case exposure plays a significant role.

The one who don’t watch these films produced under the current trend I believe he/she must have made that inference from, apart from his/her own convictions which I may fail to grasp, a certain reference that he/she has been exposed to in the past. This is where we find the impact of neo – liberal economy, where by the importation of for instance Hollywood films into our country was made possible and the films found its audience. However during the same time no research had been conducted to determine who and where are these audience found but then who are left out of the box and what is it that they want to watch instead.

During the same context, the new trend of filmmaking emerged, taking the advantage of the Nigerian films that started dominating the film domestic market in our country, and set a different atmosphere from that of Hollywood or Bollywood, they went on to find their potential audience, period. See! Beauty in the eye of the beholder! Now some of us are not among this group of audience, I guess that’s fair, but some would ask, so what’s the point of this discussion? Well, I would say there is, whether it has already become an academic enquiry or yet, there is the need to analyze the tendency rendered due to this new trend especially when audience are being taken for granted. Mine are speculations.

Some would say its not the matter of quantity but of quality, If that’s the case I think its high time we start rethinking about the tradition of quality espoused in the art of filmmaking where we find that the artistic values overrides the commercial values. The tradition of quality gave film art a status of becoming a pedagogic institution in our social contexts because apart from what the film will maintain, for audience to conjure the arrangement of events, the twists and turns, the psychological closure in it is a brain teaser that supports the development of human brain. Am worried of the psychic of the target audiences that are now “taken for granted”.

If I continue my speculations, and look up to the aesthetic processes that were involved at the emergence of this new trend of filmmaking, I would say early TV dramas played a major role. At the eve of commercial filmmaking in Tanzania, there was a shift of attention of the popular actors and actresses, TV drama producers as well as the audiences to the making of film. The movement that left a gap on the popularity of TV drama in Tanzania to date was virtue, if I may call it that, to the continuing trend of video-filmmaking in Tanzania. Why? Again from the audience perspectives, it can be analyzed that the thirsty and hunger for something of their caliber to entertain them was still there, and to obey their thirsty, they turn to the films that were now produced strategically with the same TV drama stars as the commercial motives. This tendency has been informing the commercial filmmaking in Tanzania since then, now days to become a film star, you need to find a way to TV dramas first to gain the popularity needed before you appear in a film.

I find the movement to have an impact also on the most critical problems of these commercial films’s dramatic and narrative structure. If at all, the same producers and TV drama stars are the ones who oversee the production of these films, I suspect they are just shifting some, if not all, the expertise from making TV drama to films. Am saying so as I happen to watch most of the films being made following what can be referred to as the episodic dramatic structure which is supposed to be used in TV soap operas and series.

If I treat now “the question of audiencehood” also from the writers/directors point of view of their work or vision. Let me take an example of what Gavin hood, a South African film director and writer of the Athol Fugards screen adaptation of Tsotsi, said; “the challenge in this film (Totsi) was to draw the audience into the world of a very marginal, anti-social character and have them emphasize with him”. Drawing from his view, we may see to it that screen play writers and directors knows exactly that the challenge in front of them is how to suck the audience into the film’s world. But the question is how are we (audiences who makes the potential group of film buyers and renters) supposedly sucked into the world of these commercial films produced under the current trend? Are we conscious of that fact? What does that makes us? Active, passive or just users, If that makes us users, the question will be are we satisfied with the kind of films that we have been watching for almost a decade now? If we are not, why are we buying or renting them?

In view of the current trend of video-filmmaking, it’s clear to our observation that the producers and distributors are taking the advantage of not only the audience’s taste, and interests, but also their mental capacities and their social compositions which I think shall draw them adrift if they would be no measures to conquer the situation. It should be noted that the moving images that are the raw materials of these films works not only as to entertain, inform and educate us (audiences) but also persuade audience to see the world in a particular way. But what is it that unfolds before us whenever we seat and watch these films? How do we find it? Who is responsible as to articulate that particular way in a film? Is it the author or the audience themselves?

Don’t miss the next issue of The Hill Observer where by in it I will discuss the state of film authorship in Tanzania, and the implication of it to the development of our film industry, and I shall draw examples from other film industries from around the world particularly Hollywood.