Who Owns Taste?: On Black Cinema

Still from Boyz In The Hood (1991) dir. John Singleton

When I entered my first year of university I was oblivious to the fact that I lacked taste. But what did this mean exactly? For all my life up until this point I was up to date on all the drill mixtapes, black cinema releases and all the things that made up youth culture for me. I grew up watching cult classics like Love and Basketball (2000) , Coach Carter (2005) and best of all Boyz In the Hood(1991). To me these were the best things I could have watched. But when sharing these pieces of media to my film bro peers I felt underwhelmed and left out. Left out of this club, it was full of the people who watched the ‘right’ films, listened to the ‘right’ music and consumed the ‘right’ pieces of media. Thus leading them to having great taste.  This experience taught me that what I deemed classic cinema was not a shared view. And in the metric of taste I was at the bottom. I hadn’t watched Citizen Kane (1941) yet, and even when I did. I did not care for it nor resonate with it. That experience told me that knowing all the black cultural factors didnt matter. Because I knew them, I wasn’t knowledgeable in art as a whole. Which means that I lacked taste. It told me that blackness and art do not coincide unless the producer of the art is not black. It’s about power. Who controls the narrative and who allows for it to be deemed as good. We understand that there is neither good or bad art. It is subjective. But through marketing, what type of stories are greenlit and who allows for it to be seen by mass audiences. Audiences are told what to like and dislike.  For Black cinema, this means that those stories are often left in the background. When this is done continuously it suggests that black people are incapable of telling their own stories and making great art. When great taste is a classist and racist ideology it means that because of Black people's rank within society, taste is not something that they are considered to have. 

We have become obsessed with having great taste. But what does this actually mean? 

Taste is something that is elusive and subjective. It refers to an individual or society’s capacity to make judgments about aestetic value. Oftentimes it involves personal feelings. Taste isn’t innate but is something that is created and it carry’s out a certain value. This can lead to cultural hierarchy and allow for a person to possess cultural capital. This hierarchy is dependent on class and race. What we understand is good or bad art is dependent on this cultural hierarchy. Bourdieu writes, “Cultural needs are the product of upbringing and education: surveys establish that all cultural practices (muesums visits, concert-going, reading) and preferences in literature and music are closely linked to educational level.” The problem with this idea is that it implies those from lower classes are incapable of having great taste in art. Because of their lack of ‘knowledge’, they do not know what good and bad art is. However, that is the issue with taste markers. Because they are constructed by the ruling class or the ‘cultural nobility’ which in western society is defined through whiteness. They will forever be outside of this club of tastemakers. Culture is dependent on whatever a society deems important at any point in time. But because their culture looks different to what Whiteness deems as good they lack taste. And will never possess it. 

Whiteness holds a place within culture that believes itself to have the ability to define good and bad culture. Also, what good art is. But in the context of Cinema, more specifically Black cinema, it is faced with predjuice that does not recongnise it as valuable art. Berger further emphasises this idea, suggesting that is not ‘an inherent quality’ but a social construct. Through his work Berger often challenged the art world's cultural norms in what they deem to be ‘good’ art. In this context, the outsider would be Black Film. This essay is not about the economic success or failures attached to these films, rather about how these films are treated culturally. Despite these films, connecting with black people and providing opputunity to black artits. They are still not viewed as a marker for taste.

The Relationship Between Cinema and Taste

Cinema and the concept of Taste have a strong relationship. Cinema has been a large indicator of not only an individual but also the broader social, cultural and historical shifts. Within cinema taste is often determined by demographic traits like class, ethnicity and age. Curren and Seaton, suggest that the media is controlled by a small number of companies driven by profit and power. When this trickles down, it causes taste to become specifically curated. The films produced, promoted and then watched are of specific narratives. Narrative’s that fuel the masses. To them the media is limited in variety, creativity and quality. This lack, inhibits the range of opinions and stories that is available to the audience.

The cultural nobility are also the film producers which means the people and stories that are represented lack diversity. It's not neccersarily about just having black people on screen. It is about the ways black culture and people and the consumers of this media are treated therefore after. Cinema has the ability to document social and cultural norms. Put a standstill on time. So what does it mean when the most popular film in the mainstream about black people at one point is ‘12 Years A Slave’ (2013)? It displays what the culturally noble deem good for black people. Black film does not have to feel good all the time, but when depicting trauma, history and pain. Why should lenses feel so pornographic? Why as an audience member should I feel like the white audience members are activly enjoying this? This is not a new criticism. But these markers of taste (good films) are curated for us as audience members. 

Nollywood vs Hollywood

Nollywood began as a grassroots movement in the early 1990s, catalyzed by the VHS release of the film ‘Living In Bondage’(1992). This film industry began to rise during the economic downtown within Nigeria. This made way for affordable direct-to-video films when traditional cinema downturned. This crisis made celluiod film expensive leading to the closure of cinema. This industry gave opportunities for young filmmakers to create relatable stories in the most affordable ways. Similarly Hollywood began in the beginning of the 1900s when filmmakers moved to California to escape New York's patent monopolies. California had more affordable land with varied scenery quickly establishing itself as the world film capital in the 1920s. But like Ousmane Sembene has stated, ‘the west is not my centre’. And for many viewers of Nollywood they feel the same way. Despite their similar beginnings, Nollywood is treated like a low brow industry even though it is the second leading film industry after Bollywood. The aim of Nollywood is to create stories that connect with diasporic African audiences. Nollywood films tendancy to have lower budgets more consistently in comparison to Hollywood who prioritise high budget films and marketing. Can lead to the perception that they do not value their films. But a budget does not determine a good film. And this idea leads back to classism. A way to gatekeep which art can be created.

When the classifier suggest that they enjoy Nollywood films and find meaning within them they are regarded as someone who doesn’t know cinema and has no taste. But this infers a wider conversation to how African people are often treated as spectacle rather than fully fledged human beings. That even when creating stories that make light or are honest depictions of specific folklore within a region is treated like a joke. As if there is no value within that. This form of racial teasing erases all forms of humanity that African, in this case Nigerian film makers posses.

For those who deem themselves cinephiles in the west. It only means they care about the Cinema that is produced by the west. The owner of taste should be any individual but in a capitalist world, that interacts with art in the same way. Our taste, what we deem as good is still curated. Curated to fit a white-centric standard. And to me, that is not enough.