{"id":187493,"date":"2016-02-07T07:00:21","date_gmt":"2016-02-07T07:00:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/4cd.e16.myftpupload.com\/?p=187493"},"modified":"2016-02-07T07:00:21","modified_gmt":"2016-02-07T07:00:21","slug":"betting-on-shirley-and-her-sparrow-article","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/2016\/02\/betting-on-shirley-and-her-sparrow-article\/","title":{"rendered":"Betting on Shirley and her Sparrow [Article]"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">A few weeks after the not so popular Ghana Movie Awards (GMAs), the inaugural Sparrow Entertainment Festival graced the Ghanaian cinemasphere. This is quite opportune if you ask me and it sheds light on what may be a step in the right direction for Ghanaian cinema.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">When I posited the question \u201cHow seriously should we take the GMAs?\u201d a while ago, I suggested Ghanaian cinema might be better off with a marquee film festival than a reward show that isn\u2019t remotely building the industry. As it happens, the CEO of Sparrow productions, Shirley Frimpong-Manso, is one of the few souls who read my blog \u2013 or maybe not. All the same she is presiding over what could grow into a significant Pan African film festival.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">At the moment, that assertion could be considered overreaching. The cynic in me feels this 2 day festival is just some in-house fanfare and marketing drive. The festival featured the screening of two of Shirley\u2019s upcoming productions; feature length film, <em>Rebecca<\/em> and a political serial, <em>Shampaign<\/em>. Refer to Sparrow\u2019s website for details on how the festival was structured but you can tell it is a fairly simple and restricted festival. Most of the casts featured at the event and Yvonne Okoro\u2019s red dress was the chatter of the GH blogosphere instead of maybe a few insightful interviews or reviews. I did see one review courtesy Ghanacelebreties.com so that&#8217;s something.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/thebrokencliche.files.wordpress.com\/2016\/01\/yvonne-okoro.png\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-1352\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-1352 size-cerauno-home td-animation-stack-type0-1\" src=\"https:\/\/thebrokencliche.files.wordpress.com\/2016\/01\/yvonne-okoro.png?w=600&amp;h=300&amp;crop=1\" alt=\"yvonne okoro\" width=\"600\" height=\"300\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Oh, I should also mention I could not make a trip to the festival mainly because I was busy but partly because there were intimations there was a dress code. Apparently we were to show up glamorous. I detest dress codes. To put things in perspective, there was a black tie dress code for the premiere of <em>The Dark Knight Rises<\/em> at Silverbird (then our only Cinema house) three years ago. I passed on it. On hindsight, that was actually a good thing. I digress. Deep down I wish I could have made it to the festival. There were free DVDs of Shirley\u2019s recent films and the film on show is genuinely intriguing.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_1354\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"text-align: justify;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/thebrokencliche.files.wordpress.com\/2016\/01\/rebecca2-e1452035448588.jpg\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-1354\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"wp-image-1354 size-full td-animation-stack-type0-1\" src=\"https:\/\/thebrokencliche.files.wordpress.com\/2016\/01\/rebecca2-e1452035448588.jpg\" alt=\"Rebecca2-e1452035448588\" width=\"600\" height=\"319\" \/><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Rebecca<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">At this point I can say Shirley deserves our attention. She is a solid filmmaker. She puts out good engaging stuff consistently which is commendable given the genre she likes to reside in. <em>Rebecca<\/em> looks like it could it be her best film since <em>6 hours to Christmas<\/em> or <em>Love or Something Like That<\/em> (which I haven\u2019t seen and was hoping for a free DVD of). <em>Rebecca<\/em>\u2019s official synopsis goes: \u201cAbandoned and lost in the middle of a deserted road, an egotistic proper city guy gets a rude awakening when he begins to realize that his only companion, a timid looking village girl who he had been forced to marry only a few hours earlier is anything but ordinary.\u201d An intriguing set up. I will hopefully see it upon regular release.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Now the sparrow entertainment festival isn\u2019t the first film festival to pass through the Ghanaian cinemasphere. We have had the Accra International Film Festival, Accra Francophone Film Festival, The Legon Film Event and the I Luv Africa Film Festival among others. The problem is, I only really hear about these events at least a couple of weeks from the fact. They want for clout and fanfare. I may be wrong. The Sparrow festival however is in the mainstream. They marketed well, secured the major cinema house for their event and had a slew of Ghanaian A-listers at their event. The other film festivals can\u2019t really boast having ticked all those boxes.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">There is another point to note here \u2013 the screening of a serial in <em>Shampaign<\/em>. Shirley has juggled the two primary modes of visual storytelling throughout her career. She is doing something significant in bridging the gap between the two mediums of film and TV by putting them side by side at her event. The gap between TV and film is already closing. Some prominent directors like Stephen Soderbergh have employed the use of serialised storytelling because it may suit a particular vision and that hasn\u2019t necessarily negatively affected craft with some of the best camera work, from a directorial and cinematography standpoint, playing out on TV screens.\u00a0One could argue Shirley\u2019s best work is in <em>Adams Apple<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The future of African cinema should be pan African. We catch glimpses of that future here albeit from primarily a casting standpoint. Okay, it\u2019s really just a Ghana and Naija affair but like I said, a glimpse of the future, something to build on. Next year maybe, Kunle Afolayan shows up and we know we are getting somewhere for sure but for now, I\u2019m glad the focus remains the films and not pandering politics. People turned up because of the films and filmmakers. I wont underestimate that fact.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The turnout was great. The star power made sure of that. Shirley appears to have ostensibly provided yet another stepping stone for Ghanaian cinema. The question is, does it develop next year? Do we see young filmmakers getting some valuable exposure at Sparrow\u2019s event? Do we get a platform for engaging discourse with filmmakers? Does it expand beyond an in-house party and could it be the marque film event that stands the test of time? I guess we\u2019ll live to see how things pan out. I however feel I can bet on Shirley.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">&#8211;<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">By: Delali Adogla-Bessa\/citifmonline.com\/Ghana<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Email: delalibessa@yahoo.com<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A few weeks after the not so popular Ghana Movie Awards (GMAs), the inaugural Sparrow Entertainment Festival graced the Ghanaian cinemasphere. This is quite opportune if you ask me and it sheds light on what may be a step in the right direction for Ghanaian cinema. When I posited the question \u201cHow seriously should we [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[374,137],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v20.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Betting on Shirley and her Sparrow [Article] - Citi 97.3 FM - Relevant Radio. 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