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| Jason's Sunbrella |
Sunbrella for El and EllaBy Aja DavisIt’s almost impossible not to hear about the effects that too much sun can have on your skin. Even with all of the warnings, as adults we don’t take caution to this warning. Not only do we need to protect our skin during those sunny days, we are still absorbing UV rays during rainy, snowy and overcast conditions. Some people, especially olive toned or African Americans believe and have been told that they are less likely to feel the affects of sunburn. It is a fact that they have a lower chance in getting sunburned but are still prone to getting age spots, wrinkles, and skin cancer. Wearing sunscreen everyday is highly recommended. There are many sunscreens out on the market, but so little of them have everything you need or want.Jason Natural sunblock goes far beyond expectations. What stands out the most is, it is geared toward family. The elderly to young children can wear it. It is wonderful to all skin types, especially the sensitive skin. It is a natural, chemical free product. Most sun blocks contain a chemical preservative called Paraben, which has been linked to tumors and hormone abnormalities. Jason has steered clear from this and is certified organic. It is full of antioxidants which also help with the premature aging of your skin. There is even a lip balm that smells nice like a non overwhelming mint. All of the products go on smoothly and absorb quickly into the skin. It does not leave your skin white and patchy, and when it dries, is not sticky or greasy . It is water resistant and the fragrance is very suttle. On top of all of that. Your skin will feel very soft and moisturized. One application worn while out in the sun swimming, playing sports, or sunbathing can last up five hours. I highly recommend this product for those who are tired of using products that only have some positive uses. Jason's has it all.
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Director Philippe Diaz and The End of Poverty?
Pan African Film Festival review
By Ed Rampell
The 17th annual Pan African Film Festival, which took place Feb. 5-16, was the same as usual. By this, I mean to compliment one of Los Angele’s true cultural gems, which year after year screens a frothy concoction of Black-themed indie, foreign, documentary, short subject, student and commercial studio movies and videos. Indeed, the biggest departure for 2009’s PAFF was its screening venue, as the venerable festival relocated from its longtime location at the then-Magic Johnson Theatres at Crenshaw to the Culver Plaza Theatres. The fact that Culver City, as the home of fabled Hollywood studios, has played a historic role in the cinema is underscored by the delightful photo and painted murals of movie icons such as Errol Flynn, Judy Garland and Gene Kelly that adorn the walls of the Culver Plaza Theatres.
The most valuable role PAFF plays is as a gateway for specialty cinema, either premiering pictures or screening films that Angelenos would not even have an opportunity to see, unless they traveled to far-flung countries such as Ethiopia or embargoed Cuba. The following is a cross section of this year’s offerings at America’s largest film festival of its kind.
Nonfiction biopics of back icons were screened, such as Annette von Wangenheim’s Joesphine Baker: Black Diva in a White Man’s World, about the actress, dancer and chanteuse who went from Harlem’s Cotton Club to Parisian cabarets. After taking Europe by storm Baker, who was renowned for her onstage shimmying scantily clad in banana leaves, remained in France, where there was less racism, and went on to heroically serve in the French resistance against the Nazis.
Sam Pollard’s Zora Neale Hurston: Jump at the Sun did not shrink from revealing the contradictions, as well as the glories, of this central figure of the Harlem Renaissance, a folklorist and author who during the 1920s proclaimed the “New Negritude,” but also allegedly ripped Langston Hughes off and ended up attacking the Supreme Court’s ruling in favor of school desegregation. Huston became a sort of forerunner of the conservative black pundits cable TV news never has trouble finding, even as broadcast TV still somehow lags behind in presenting integrated and black-themed programming.
On the other hand, the otherwise informative AMS documentary, The Real Great Debaters – which examined the facts behind the Denzel Washington-directed fiction film The Great Debaters – avoided the biggest question raised by the 2007 feature. Although the doc reveals that the feature fudged the truth by depicting the white team defeated by Wiley College’s eloquent arguers as Harvard (it was really none other than our very own USC – which went on to formally deny Wiley the championship), the real Great Debaters doesn’t even remotely deal with whether or not debate coach and poet Melvin Tolson (Washington's character) was a Communist Party member, as suggested by the feature. This may be one of the rare times in cinema history when the fiction film was more honest than the nonfiction film, although the latter remains worth seeing.
The San Fernando Valley-based left-leaning distributor Cinema Libre Studios produced The End of Poverty? which will be theatrically released in September, but had its L.A. premiere at PAFF. This thoughtful, hard-hitting documentary traces the 15th century origins of Third World poverty to the introduction of capitalism by European colonizers, and reveals how the perpetuation of the unequal distribution of wealth continues to this very day, and will only end when resource and income inequality are gapped. The doc’s insightful – and inciting -- commentators include Blowback author Chalmers Johnson, “economic hitman” John Perkins and economist Jospeh Stiglitz. After the PAFF screening director Philippe Diaz did a Q&A with the audience.
Kangamba is a feature about the decisive military role Cuba played in 1983 during the national liberation struggle in Angola, backing the MPLA against South Africa-backed UNITA. This stand up and cheer film was actually smuggled out of Cuba and past the U.S. blockade so it could be presented at PAFF. While revolutionary in content Kangamba’s form is quite conventional, and reminded me of all those World War II pix co-starring William Bendix, such as 1943’s Guadalcanal Diary. All other Cuban films I’ve seen, such as last year’s PAFF entry from Cuba, El Benny, had a bolder cinematic stylistic sensibility. Perhaps Kangamba is more aesthetically conservative because the director of this co-production, Rogelio Paris, is Brazilian.
The doc Cuba: An African Odyssey covered some of the same subject matter, the untold story of the role Castro’s Cuba played in ending apartheid. Last year PAFF screened a feature with a similar theme, Nambia: The Struggle for Liberation with Danny Glover, directed by Charles Burnett (whose 1977 Killer of Sheep was presented by PAFF this year).
Other features screened by PAFF this year include the 1967 Oscar winner In the Heat of the Night starring Sidney Poitier and Rod Steiger, Spike Lee’s 2008 Miracle at St. Anna and Sugar, about a Dominican baseball player’s effort to break into the major leagues. The following are the finalists for PAFF’s awards in various categories.
PAFF COMPETITION WINNERS:
BEST NARRATIVE FEATURE
Prince of Broadway - US
Honorable Mention
Happy Sad - Trinidad/Tobago
BEST DOCUMENTARY FEATURE
Cuba, An African Odyssey - France
Honorable Mention
The End of Poverty? - US
BEST NARRATIVE SHORT
Kwame - US
Honorable Mention
Warrior Queen - Ghana
BEST DOCUMENTARY SHORT
Scarred Justice: The Orangeburg Massacre - US
Honorable Mention
Faubourg Treme’: The Untold Story of Black New Orleans - US
BEST FIRST FEATURE - DIRECTOR
Rain - Bahamas
JURY FAVORITE
Skin - US
PAFF AUDIENCE FAVORITE WINNERS: BEST NARRATIVE FEATURE
Skin - US
BEST DOCUMENTARY FEATURE
Nubian Spirit: The African Legacy of the Nile Valley - Sudan/UK
PAFF DIRECTOR'S AWARD: BEST NARRATIVE FEATURE
Sugar - US
BEST DOCUMENTARY FEATURE
Milking the Rhino - US
PAFF PROGRAMMER'S AWARD: BEST NARRATIVE FEATURE
Standing N Truth - US
BEST DOCUMENTARY FEATURE
Run Baby Run - Ghana
PAFF is always presented in February -- “Black History Month.” I suspect that this is because PAFF is not only Black, but it is, indeed, historic.
For more information see: www.paff.org.
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