Director Spotlight: AVA DUVERNAY

Had already seen: Selma (2014), A Wrinkle In Time (2018), two episodes of Queen Sugar

Watched for this: 13th (documentary) (2016), When They See Us (2019), I Will Follow (2010), Middle of Nowhere (2012),My Mic Sounds Nice (TV short documentary) (2010), The Door (short) (2013), Jay Z: Family Feud ft. Beyoncé (video short) (2017)

Have not seen: Saturday Night Life (short) (2006), This Is The Life (documentary) (2008), Compton In C Minor (short) (2009), TV One Night Only: Live From The Essence Music Festival (TV movie documentary) (2010), Essence Presents: Faith in 2010 (TV short) (2010), Scandal (1 episode) (2013), For Justice (TV movie) (2015), August 28th (documentary short) (2016), Nine for IX: Venus Vs (TV documentary series, 1 episode) (2013) 

I find it interesting that so many of her early efforts are music-related. I have only been able to find My Mic Sounds Nice to watch, but I would be interested in the others.

Otherwise I think the main thing I come away with from watching more DuVernay is a sense of vision. I know that she uses good actors and designers and that is a help, but I also see a great sense of imagination and an openness to inspiration.

I am actually at kind of a weird place for writing about her. For past viewing, I have written about A Wrinkle in Time and six(!) posts about Selma. (And so much about Queen Sugar, but that is less her directing and more producing.) I just finished When They See Us, and I think I am going to have a lot to say about that as I process it.

Instead I will focus on two in the middle that are not well known, but the library had them: I Will Follow and Middle of Nowhere

I Will Follow has some music focus too, as the main character reflects on her recently deceased aunt - a legendary session drummer - schooling her on the music of U2. Mainly it is about moving on, as after about a year caring for her dying aunt, it is time to clean and finish and theoretically but maybe not possibly return to her old life. 

Middle of Nowhere also has a woman who has put her life on hold for someone else, working night shifts and giving up weekends for long bus rides to visit her jailed husband. 

I am in the middle of so much transition - then when I watched the movies, but still now - that they resonated with me. So many of my choices have been made for other people. Without even being wrong choices, they have still left me in a hard place, with a lot of unknowns.

Both movies end up in the air. The protagonists have gained some understanding or reconciliation, but there are still many things unresolved and messy relationships all over the place. There are people who know what they want and can't seem to get it, and people just stuck, even though it seems like it should be easier.

The most interesting relationships for me were in I Will Follow. There was an aunt and niece, but that aunt was also a mother to a frustrated daughter, who resented her cousin being the caregiver, but who would also not have done well as the caregiver, especially given her anger at her mother's decision to end treatment for her cancer, and go out peacefully. 

That resentment is worse because of its base in a previous rocky relationship, where the aunt and niece could get along and share interests in a way that the mother and daughter could not. It is poked at when the daughter sees that envied cousin bonding with her son. Aunts again.

Clearly everyone needed to accept and embrace people as themselves, but that is more easily said than done. There are lots of different ways of being selfish and jealous and hurt, and it seems like they found all of them. 

Also, perhaps we cannot relate to our parents like everyone else. It may not be fair, and it may not be terrible, but there are pressures there that are hard to ignore. Maybe "embracing" is still the answer.

Related posts:

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2018/07/a-wrinkle-in-storytelling.html

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2015/02/selma-emotional-impact.html 

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2015/02/selma-choices.html 

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2015/02/selma-academy-fails.html 

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2015/02/selma-and-lbj.html 

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2015/02/selma-not-even-past.html

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2015/02/selma-lessons-for-now.html

https://sporkful.blogspot.com/2020/02/black-history-month-2019-overview-black.html