Farafina magazine presents: Charles Mayaki at the 2009 PAFF festival

Day 10
Another Love Story
What country has the largest black population in the world after Nigeria? If you answered Brazil, you guessed right, though this qualification comes with its own protestations. To reiterate, while people of mixed descent are referred to, in most other countries as black, in Brazil they are called ‘Pardo’ to differentiate from [...]

Farafina magazine presents: Charles Mayaki at PAFF Festival

Day 9

A Day of Documentaries and a classic

Cuba: An African Odyssey (2008)

When Nelson Mandela was finally released from prison in 1990, one of the first people he asked to meet was the Cuban Leader, Fidel Castro. This BBC documentary explains why, and might be the finest example on why Cuba is important [...]

Farafina magazine presents: Charles Mayaki at the 2009 PAFF festival

Day 8
A Day of Short Films
There are a lot of short films playing in the festival. Short films often are the starting point for future talents in the movie industry. There are five films playing in the festival.
Worth mentioning is the short film, Happy Anniversary Punk!, which lasted for thirty minutes by Nigerian-American [...]

Farafina magazine presents: Charles Mayaki at the PAFF festival

Day 7
The Fine Arts Section of the Festival
At the festival, there is also a Fine Arts section. It’s taking place at the Crenshaw Plaza in Los Angeles.
Take a look at some of the stalls and goods on display.

Farafina Magazne presents: Charles Mayaki at the 2009 PAFF Festival

Day 6
The African immigrant’s experience is rarely shown on screen but today’s programme included two movies tackling that very theme.
In Prince of Broadway, Lucky, portrayed by Ghanaian Prince Adu, is an African immigrant who hustles “knock off” designer goods in New York for his Armenian boss, Levon (Karren Karagulian). He lives alone in a studio [...]

Farafina magazine presents: Charles Mayaki at the 2009 PAFF Festival

Day 5
A slow day with two documentaries films watched.
African Underground
The first is from Senegal titled African Underground: Democracy in Dakar. Following the Hip-hop movement in Senegal as it relates to political consciousness, it focuses on Hip-hop as the voice of the people in a country with high unemployment and poverty. Tracking the roots of rap [...]

THE CHANGE-A-LIFE PROJECT

The Change-A-Life project in partnership with the Lagos State Government will celebrate its seventh year of operations by becoming formally institutionalized as Change-A-Life Foundation. The event will be televised live on Nigeria Television Authority (NTA) on February 21, 2009 between 7pm – 9pm.

The project, which is championed by Ms. Funmi Iyanda, began [...]

Farafina magazine presents: Charles Mayaki at the 2009 PAFF Festival

Day 4
As the festival enters its fourth day, the professional standard of the screenings is being called into question as most movies have desaturated images and poor framing. The problem is due, in part, to the DVD format of the majority of the films and the newness of the cinema house where they’ve been screened.

Two [...]

Farafina Magazine Presents: Charles Mayaki at the 2009 PAFF Festival

Day 3
The third day of PAFF kicked off with a panel discussion on Notorious, a movie about the life of Christopher Wallace aka Notorious B.I.G. Moderated by journalist Farai Chideya, the panel was made up of producer Bobby Teitel, writers Cheo Hodari Coker and Reggie Blythewood, and casting director Twinkie Byrd.
The fast-paced discussion benefitted from [...]

Farafina Magazine Presents: Charles Mayaki at the 2009 PAFF Festival

“The advent of video with its cheap cost and processing has provided Africans the opportunity to take the cameras into the streets and tell the tales of the common man. The two biggest industries, Nigeria and Ghana, have used the opportunity to overwhelm us with melodrama and love stories stolen from the worst of Indian cinema and the Brazilian telenovela industry”