Father Geek here with our African crew of editor/reporters, Dr. SOTHA at his labs outside Capetown, South Africa... and Rigobert Song somewhere out on the vast North African Plains. Once again they've put together an interesting Report for all of you with an eye for African... annnnd Afro-American Cinema news...

DR.SOTHA here for another Africa-AICN. Thank God I have this column as a way of releasing some of the emotional turmoil I have experienced this week. Nurse Hollis and field officer Paige Marshal have returned to the labs licking their wounds after the Eel Dragon turned on them in South Korea. They had to slaughter the animal after it attacked them with its violet tongued venom in a moment of intense psychological distress while they were in the sewers beneath the city. The two have pleaded for their job back here at DR.SOTHA ROBOTICS INC. and I have taken a week off to make up my mind. How can I ever trust them again after the stunt they pulled?

To sway my vote email me at africaaicn@hotmail.com with your slander.

SOUTH AFRICA

* Principal photography on the Motion Picture Corporation of America (MPCA) /Apollo Media GmbH & Co. / Film Afrika Worldwide feature, ‘Consequence’, has commenced in August in Cape Town. Produced by Brad Krevoy (Threesome, Retroactive, The Suburbans), Frank Huebner, David Lancaster (Loving Jezebel, Second Skin, Borderline,), David Wicht (Promised Land, Mandela & De Klerk, Second Skin) and Adam Richman, the feature is directed by Tony Hickox (Last Run, Lost in Time, Hellraiser III) from a screenplay by Hawk Ostby and Mark Fergus.

This marks the third feature to be shot in South Africa by MPCA / Apollo Media GmbH & Co. and Film Afrika Worldwide this year. The two previous features, Borderline directed by Evelyn Purcell and starring Gina Gershon, Sean Patrick Flanery and Michael Biehn, and Pavement directed by Darrell James Roodt and starring Robert Patrick and Lauren Holly are currently in post-production. Consequence is a classic thriller starring Armand Assante (The Odyssey, Paradise Alley, Fatal Instinct, Striptease), Ricky Schroder (NYPD Blue, Crimson Tide, The Champ) and Lola Glaudini (Blow, NYPD Blue, Groove) with Danny Keogh, Grant Swanby and Langley Kirkwood. Max Tyler’s (Assante) career as a hot-shot dentist is brought to an abrupt end when a botched operation! on a supermodel leads to his being struck from the dental council. As his idyllic life falls apart, Max devises a plan to reinvent himself and start anew. However his cleverly conceived plan goes horribly wrong and soon his life spirals dangerously out of control. The action packed feature will be shot entirely on location in and around Cape Town and principal photography is scheduled for completion in early September 2002.

* Brewing giant Diageo is attempting to cash-in on the widespread popularity of Michael Powell, a fictional journalist and star of its recent pan-African TV campaign for Guinness, by financing a $3m (£2m) feature film based around the character. The action thriller, which has just started principal photography on the outskirts of Johannesburg, is being directed by Jason Xenopolous, executive produced by former Guinness Africa marketing director Celia Couchman and produced by Bob Mahoney through South African production company, Moonlighting. The film, which has a working title of The African Story, stars Powell and American journalist sidekick Ed who unite to take on unscrupulous political gangsters. Xenopolous, whose debut feature Promised Land will premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival next month, said he had drawn ! inspiration from 1970s thrillers such as Marathon Man and Three Days Of The Condor. "It's basically a first world thriller meeting up with the concept of 'African-chic'. Sure there's product placement but no more than BMW in a Bond flick and certainly far less than FedEx in Castaway," he told Screendaily.com. Diageo's move comes at the same time as motor manufacturer Merecedes Benz is currently riding a huge wave of public interest with a series of adverts in the form of cinema trailers Couchman claimed the film was unique. "We first of all had to make sure we had a very strong story and that it wouldn't just be an advertorial. I believe we're creating a world first. Guinness does have product placement in the picture but that is all."

* South African wildlife documentary City Slickers: A Tail of Two African Penguins by Pelican Pictures, (South Africa), has been selected in the Asia/Africa category for the semi final round of judging in the International Emmy Awards, in August 2002. The IEmmmys are awarded to the best international television programmes as selected by the USA's National Academy of Televison Arts and Sciences (NATAS) international jury. Eight competing documentaries have gone through two rounds of judging, in 4 categories. There is some strong competition for the Award: other semi finalists in the documentary category include: Offspring Barna-Alper Productions, Inc. (Canada) The Blue Planet BBC (UK), D! ecision at Age 18 - Israeli Youths Refuse to Fight NHK (Japan), Soul of a Century La Camera Stylo Film Collection GmbH (Germany), Nicholas Winton - The Power of Good Trigon Production (Slovak Republic).

* Top Durban casting agency Troubadour Productions is looking for background extras for a feature film which will be partly shot in Durban at the beginning of October. "We are looking for a cross section of the population as typically would be found in Fort Lauderdale USA round about 1983, such as college youngsters and general passers by," says Peter Gardner who heads Troubadour. "A film day shoot is twelve hours long and the scenes involved take place from dusk into night. Candidates will have to be prepared to work from mid afternoon well into the night.

Casting will take place at Troubadour Productions at 286 Jan Smuts Highway in Mayville on Friday 30th August and Saturday 31st August from 10h00. A major requirement is that those auditioning must have a contact telephone number. They must also bring along a recent postcard-size photograph of head and shoulders. If these are not available, photographs will be taken at a fee of R5.00. All enquiries to Peter Gardner on 083 225 7934

* As to be expected, Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones' shenanigans are still drawing in huge audiences at the South African box office as Men In Black II retains its number one spot. The film has made a staggering R6 161 381 (about the price of a grain of rice in America – DR.SOTHA) in just two weeks of release. Next up is ‘new’ entry High Crimes (Ashley Judd / Morgan Freeman), followed by the creepy-looking, sci-fi-ish Resident Evil, Bend It Like Beckham and Murder by Numbers. Former number one, Scooby Doo is at number 10, having made R9 206 566 in five weeks.

* SCRAWL has announced the screenwriters from Southern Africa that have been selected for SCRAWL screenwriters’ laboratory for this year. It will be held in Monkey Valley in Noordhoek (South Africa) in October this year. They are: Helena Nougeira with All That Breaks, Tim Greene with Twist, Teboho Mahlatsi and Peter Esterhuyse with Scar, Mpaki Molapo with Happy Days Are Here Again, Greg Latter with Forgiveness, Ian Roberts with Renaissance, Catharina Weinek with The Russian Princess, David Hickson with Gail force, Siyolwe Wabei with Wade In The Water, Donovan Marsh with Bernie and novelist Sello Duiker. Two script editors and two creative producers will be invited as observers to the lab. SCRAWL is an associate of Robert Redford's Sundance Institution in the US, The Performing Arts lab (PAL), UK, Wits School of the Arts and the Cinemart, Rotterdam. The lab director of SCRAWL is Colin VAines, Head of Development for Miramax in New York. He will put together a team of tutors from the US and the UK for the lab.

NORTH AFRICA

* Rigobert Song next:

Hello readers. Once again it is time to praise another African film that has shown great maturity and relevance in modern day society, ‘God Is African’ is one such film. In many ways this is the African version of John Singleton’s ‘Higher Learning’. It stirs up the same ethical and racial questions pertinent to a world-wide audience. Remember to email me at rigobertsong@hotmail.com with your African film musings.

GOD IS AFRICAN – Written & Directed by Akin Omotoso

It is 1995. Nelson Mandela has recently become South Africa's first black president, heralding the dawn of a new democracy. Thrust onto the world stage, South Africa begins to play an integral role in African affairs. But when the government exercises a subdued approach toward the planned executions of Nigerian writer/environmentalist Ken Saro Wiwa and eight other men, students at Key University decide to do something more dramatic. Determined to raise awareness about human rights and xenophobia, one student, Femi broadcasts an intense political argument over the campus radio station without permission. He is shocked to find that instead of raising awareness and receiving support, his act makes him the object of ridicule. Suddenly, he is confronted by both a hatred of "kwere-kwere" (foreigners) and a cynical disinterest in what goes on in the "other" Africa. When the executions go ahead as planned, the campus popu! lation is forced to wake up and question its attitudes toward one another. By examining the future for Africa's post-apartheid generation, God is African breaks down cultural barriers and portrays a new consciousness of what it is to be African.

* Omega TV, which will be the second independent free-to-air television station in Zambia, will go on air by the end of the year. The station, which is finalising its set up budget of US$200,000, will broadcast from the 23rd floor of Findico House, the tallest building in Lusaka where transmission facilities have already been set up. A British documentary filmmaker, Weymont was at the Festival of Dhow Countries in Zanzibar shopping for appropriate films for the new station. She said Omega TV is a non-profit-making broadcaster "seeking to not only provide airtime to African films but also help improve their quality and enhance their marketability on the international market." "We must lobby our governments to introduce quota system on the number of foreign and local programmes on air. This is the only way Africa programmes will survive against the onslaught from the Developed world," she noted, adding that Omega TV will air local programmes with no charge! to producers. Saying she was amazed at the wide variety of documentaries at the festival, Weymont was particularly impressed by South Africa's Steps for the Future series (on Aids) and The Soviet Implosion (a political analysis on African countries after the disintegration of the Soviet Union) by Zimbabwean director Martin Chiketa. Whereas FESPACO majors in highlighting feature films, Weymont said ZIFF is stronger in documentaries and in cultural activities undertaken by women and children. "Taking films to villages to inculcate in people the culture of movie-going is quite an impressive effort by ZIFF. I also pay tribute to ZIFF for undertaking to translate Lumumba into Kiswahili so it reaches many more people."

AFRICAN AMERICAN

* Rosario Dawson, onscreen in "Men in Black II," has come aboard to play the female lead in Universal Pictures' untitled action-adventure project (aka "Helldorado") for director Peter Berg (Very Bad Things). Dawson will segue into the films' Sept. 20 start after she wraps shooting Lions Gate Films' "Shattered Glass," shooting in Montreal. The action-adventure project reteams Universal and Dawson, who starred in the studio's "Josie and the Pussycats."

* In reporting on the disastrous performance of the sci-fi comedy The Adventures of Pluto Nash, which reportedly cost $100 million to produce, Daily Variety commented today (Monday) that it was "so abysmal it had B.O.-watchers mentioning the industry's most legendary fiascoes like pricey flops Town & Country, Ishtar and Heaven's Gate." Film critics weighed in on the movie over the weekend, after Warner Bros. refused to screen it for them earlier. As the studio must have expected, the reviews were scathing: "Watching it is like watching 90 minutes of outtakes -- deleted scenes randomly assembled by a drunken night watchman at the studio," wrote Lou Lumenick in the New York Post. Jack Mathews in the New York Daily News observed that the Eddie Murphy movie is set in 2087, "which is about the earliest he can hope to be forgiven." Stephen Hunter in the Washington Post observed that the movie wasn't even forgettable, "because there's nothing to forget." David Hiltbrand in the Philadelphia Inquirer noted that the movie sat on Warner Bros.' shelf for nearly two years while the studio reworked it, hoping to breathe life into it. "You might as well try to revive a stuffed moose," Hiltbrand commented. But in answer to the question, how bad is this movie really? Wesley Morris of the Boston Globe recounted that when he saw the movie in a local theater, "the gentleman eight rows in front of me spent most of the movie on his cellphone. And no one asked him to stop talking. Maybe they all thought he was trying to get someone at the studio to fess up to greenlighting this cosmic slop."

* Some of the top stars of "blaxploitation" movies have condemned civil rights organizations for undermining a nascent black film thirty years ago and putting hundreds of black actors, directors and crew members out of work. In the documentary Baadasssss Cinema, debuting on the Independent Film channel, Fred "The Hammer" Williamson, who starred in such films as Black Caesar, Bucktown, and Hell Up in Harlem, says angrily: "NAACP and CORE - they're the ones who created this terminology: black exploitation. That has to be clear, on the record. It came from them. It didn't come from the white press. ... Who was being exploited? All the black actors were getting paid. They had a job. They were going to work. The audience wasn't being exploited. They were getting to see things on their screen they'd longed for." Likewise Pam Grier (Coffy, Foxy Brown) recalls black critics saying "Oh, my god, we shouldn't show pimps to white America. ... They'll think we're all like this." The documentary ushers in a series of blaxploitation "tributes," on IFC, including Foxy Brown, Superfly and Shaft's Big Score.

* Vin Diesel has fired the opening salvo in the battle between his spy thriller XXX and the forthcoming James Bond movie Die Another Day - by labeling 007 outdated. The 35-year-old, whose new film is top of the US box office chart, says his high-octane character Xander Cage is the type of secret agent who will appeal to a generation raised on skateboarding and extreme sports. He says, "To take nothing away from the Bond movies - I loved them - the Bond character is about as relevant to young audiences as someone like Clark Gable. I mean, Bond wears a suit. No kid today wears a suit. Xander Cage doesn't have a lot of hangups - he's not going to a therapist. He's a doer of deeds and makes no bones about being the new breed of supera! gent. In that respect, I think he is the voice of the younger generation."

* Comeback singer Mariah Carey has been ordered to keep her curves under wraps by the head of her new record label. The sexy star, who suffered mental problems last year before being dropped from her lucrative recording deal with Virgin records, is famed for showing off her womanly figure in skimpy outfits - but Def Jam boss Lyor Cohen now wants Carey to cover up. Cohen reportedly asked her, "If you have a magnificent voice and you write such compelling songs, why are you dressing like that." A source adds, "Lyor wants Mariah to forget about the glitz and concentrate on music." The Honey hitmaker has nearly finished her debut album for the hip-hop specialists.

* Aaliyah's record company Virgin Records has been accused of going back on a promise to pay the funeral expenses of the late R 'n' B queen. The owner of a Bahamian funeral home alleges the firm made a verbal agreement to pay the $68,000 cost of preparing the singer's body and flying it home following her death in a plane crash last year. Loretta Turner, director of Butlers' Funeral Home in Nassau, says there was also a promise to pay for arrangements for the eight other passengers who died in the 25 August disaster. Attorneys for Aaliyah's parents, Michael and Diane Haughton, have prepared a lawsuit against Virgin that says the company never filled its promise to pay Brooklyn-born Aaliyah's funeral expenses. Virgin representatives have refused comment. Turner now plans to hold on to the death certificates of the passengers and pilot, which will be needed before Aaliyah's estate can be settled, if she is not paid for her services.

* Wesley Snipes took a beating in his new boxing movie - because he wanted to know exactly how it feels to fight a heavyweight. The blows the Blade star takes from Ving Rhames in new film Undisputed are for real, and Snipes admits he went through days of mind-pounding pain to play a jailed boxer. He says, "When you get hit, you get hit and it hurts. You have to do that for two or three minutes at a time." Snipes even tried to follow a boxer's training regimes, working out for hours every day and giving up sex. He adds, "I tried my best to give it up. I gave it all I could give." The actor, who turned 40 on July 31, says despite his bumps and bruises, which took a while to heal, he feels like he's in the best shape of his life - and it's all down to a healthy appetite and his! training regime. The fifth degree karate Black Belt, who practices hardcore Brazilian martial art capoeira, explains, "I feel like I'm in my 20s. It's all in your mind - how you eat, how you live, how you think. I'm a seafood guy - I see it and I eat it. I'm allergic to shellfish but I'll eat anything else."

* The website promoting Don Cornelius's syndicated Soul Train show (which has been airing since 1971) has accused BET, the black entertainment channel, of promoting a petition protesting the decision to award singer Ashanti Soul Train's Aretha Franklin Entertainer of the Year Award. The petition appears on the Petitiononline website , which collects online "signatures" for numerous causes. The anti-Ashanti petition has been "signed" by nearly 20,000 people, but it could not be determined who instigated it. The statement on the Soul Train website claims that Petitiononline "with publicity and linking support from white-owned BET.com, is fostering a vicious, uninformed and wrong-headed hate campaign" against Ashanti. BET immediately responded that Soul Train's accusation was "absurd" and noted that Ashanti was among its nominees for 2002 BET awards. Commented Steve Ivory on the Entertainment Urban Report website: "Black music fans haven't been this divide! d since 1975, when the Jackson brothers departed black-owned Motown for CBS Records (now Sony)." (Viacom, which now owns CBS-TV, acquired BET in 2000.)

DR.SOTHA REVO & OUT!