film

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The great actor and great humanitarian Mark Ruffalo apologized on Twitter last week for asserting that Israel was committing “genocide” toward the Palestinians, saying that the accusation was inaccurate, inflammatory and disrespectful and he had thought better of it. He also implied that such language was related to anti-Semitic hate […]

Books

Mrs. Hemingway, Israel, and the Palestinians

Shalom Goldman

Middlebury, Vt. (Special to Informed Comment) – In the current PBS series on Ernest Hemingway’s life and work, Martha Gellhorn, the journalist and novelist who was the third of Hemingway’ four wives, is sympathetically and vividly featured. But one important, perhaps defining, aspect of her life is glossed over. Similarly, in the 2012 HBO movie […]

Africa

Chadwick Boseman’s Wakanda: Afro-Futurism is in the Present

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Chadwick Boseman’s tragic death at the all too young age of 43 from colorectal cancer has been weighing on me the past couple of days. I am a fan. But I also am battling cancer, and I think I understand his incredible productivity in his last years, as he knew […]

African-Americans

Black Lives Mattering: HBO’s ‘Lovecraft Country’ demonstrates that Racism is the True Horror

The Conversation

By Guy Stephen Webster | – Lovecraft Country, a new series from HBO adapted from the 2016 novel by Matt Ruff, takes a critical look at the legacy of the controversial but classic horror writer, HP Lovecraft. By doing so it also sheds a light on the mode of literature he famously pioneered: weird fiction. […]

film

By rejecting stereotypes, Slam and Ramy show us authentic Arab Muslim men on screen

The Conversation

By Sherene Idriss | – There is a long history of damaging stereotypes of Arab and Muslim men on screen. Because of this, audiences from culturally diverse migrant backgrounds understandably crave more positive representations of their ethnic and cultural communities. Two new screen productions – Ramy and Slam – tell stories embracing the complexity of […]

film

How the New ‘Aladdin’ stacks up against a Century of Orientalist Hollywood Stereotyping

The Conversation

By Evelyn Alsultany |- Though critically acclaimed and widely beloved, the 1992 animated “Aladdin” feature had some serious issues with stereotyping. In the live-action ‘Aladdin,’ Mena Massoud stars Aladdin, while Will Smith plays the Genie. Daniel Smith/Walt Disney Pictures Disney wanted to avoid repeating these same problems in the live action version of “Aladdin,” which […]

Featured

Not Trump’s America: On How the Oscars looked Like the Real America this Year

Juan Cole

Cuarón: “”I want to thank the Academy for recognizing a film centered around an indigenous woman. One of the 70 million domestic workers in the world without work rights”

film

Race for Film Gold at Cannes in shadow of #MeToo & Gaza

Deborah Cole

Movies by Spike Lee, South Korea’s Lee Chang-dong, Italian Matteo Garrone and Nadine Labaki of Lebanon drew critical acclaim

Africa

Why Black Panther’s Wakanda Is the Black Utopia We’ve Been Waiting For

contributors

By Ingrid LaFleur | ( Yes! Magazine) | – – Before the film was released, the nation of Wakanda was taking shape in our minds. Ingrid LaFleur posted Feb 07, 2018 “When I wondered if imagination could be necessary for the revolution and transformation, you said yes, you said our dreams and visions matter, they […]