Hair love

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Movie
German title Hair love
Original title Hair love
Country of production United States
original language English
Publishing year 2019
length 7 minutes
Rod
Director Matthew A. Cherry ,
Everett Downing Jr.,
Bruce W. Smith
script Matthew A. Cherry
production Karen Rupert Toliver,
Stacey Newton,
Monica A. Young,
Matthew A. Cherry,
David Steward II,
Carl Reed
music Paul Mounsey ,
Daniel D. Crawford,
Taylor Graves
occupation

Issa Rae : mother (voice)

Hair Love is an American animated short film directed by Matthew A. Cherry . It is about a black girl and her father who tries to do her hair for the first time. It was funded through Kickstarter and has Issa Rae as the spokesperson.

The film premiered in cinemas as the supporting film for Angry Birds 2 on August 14, 2019. At the 2020 Academy Awards , it was named Best Animated Short Film. Hair Love was also implemented as a children's book with illustrations by Vashti Harrison in May 2019 .

An associated television series called Young Love was announced for HBO Max .

action

The black girl Zuri wants to do her Afro herself for the first time on a day that she has marked with a heart on her calendar . For this they used a tutorial video file of vlogs Hair Love her mother, but fails. Her father, who wears dreadlocks himself , tries to tame her hairstyle with a comb and elastic bands, and then wants to put a cap on her. Zuri shows him the instruction video of the hairstyle she wants, in which her mother demonstrated it to Zuri. When the father follows the instructions step by step, the hairstyle succeeds. Before they go out, Zuri takes a drawing from her room.

In a hospital, the mother sits in a wheelchair and wears a headscarf. After Zuri and her father come in, she hands over the drawing made with wax crayons , which shows the mother with a bald head and a yellow crown. Then the mother takes off the headscarf and lets Zuri touch her bald head. The three embrace and leave the hospital room.

During the Closing Credits , the mother's hair grows back and the family does each other's hair. The mother records an instruction video in which the father is doing Zuri's hair.

background

Inspiration and theme

Hair Love was created by former American football player Matthew A. Cherry . He had the idea for this several years before production. To do this, he was inspired by videos on social media in which black fathers do the hair of their daughters. In an interview with the Washington Post , he said he had two goals with the film: to encourage children to accept their natural hair and to display the image he saw in the Internet videos but not yet on screen, which is black Fathers who have a strong presence in their children's lives. He was also concerned about the lack of representation in animated films and therefore wanted to show a young black family. About the positive portrayal of black fathers, he told the Chicago Sun Times that gender roles have changed and there is now the situation that the mother goes to work and the father takes the children down. “I have the feeling that everyone has to improve and get it right. Black fathers had the worst reputation in the mainstream media for being portrayed as failures who did not participate. "It was important to him to show a young father with tattoos who would not be assumed to be a loving father. who does his daughter's hair. In his Oscar speech, he said the film was made to normalize black hair. (This means hair of black people, not black-haired in the sense of hair color.)

This concern is related to the discrimination against black hair in the United States, which is often perceived and devalued as unprofessional and neglected by Western beauty standards. In schools that banned black hairstyles such as afros and dreadlocks in dress codes , there was bullying and the exclusion of black students from classes and events. In July 2019, California signed the CROWN Act, which prohibits discrimination based on hair structure; thereafter similar in New Jersey and New York City .

financing

The film was funded in 2017 through a crowdfunding campaign on Kickstarter.com that far exceeded the original target of $ 75,000 and grossed over $ 280,000. This represents the record in earning a short film on the crowdfunding platform. Prominent black supporters included actresses Yara Shahidi and Gabourey Sidibe , animators Everett Downing Jr. and Frank Abney of Pixar, and Bruce W. Smith, creator of the Prouds , and Peter Ramsey , co-director of the Oscar-winning Spider-Man: A New Universe .

production

Cherry contacted Karen Rupert Toliver , a studio manager at 20th Century Animation who then moved to Sony Pictures Animation and joined the project as a co-producer for help . Frank Abney and Peter Ramsey became executive producers; Everett Downing Jr. and Bruce Smith alongside Cherry directors. The film was produced by Sony Pictures Animation in partnership with Lion Forge Animation. The animations were produced in the Six Point Harness studio in Los Angeles . Actress Issa Rae was cast as the spokeswoman .

publication

Movie

The film was first shown as a supporting film for Angry Birds 2 on August 14, 2019 , making it the first animated short film to be shown in American cinemas that year. It was published on YouTube on December 5, 2019 . In 2020 he also appeared in January before Jumanji: The Next Level and in February before Little Women .

Children's book

Hair Love was published as a children's book on May 14, 2019 by Kokila, an imprint of the Penguin Group , with illustrations by Vashti Harrison, the character designer for the film. It made the New York Times bestseller list for children's books.

  • Matthew A. Cherry (Author), Vashti Harrison (Illustrator): Hair Love , Kokila, 2019, ISBN 9780525553366

Awards

Hair Love won an Oscar for best animated short film. Cherry had already predicted an Oscar nomination in 2012, and in 2016 when he was looking for animators for "an Oscar-worthy short film idea". The celebrity couple, actress Gabrielle Union and basketball player Dwyane Wade , who are the film's associative producers, invited college student DeAndre Arnold, who had been suspended from school and excluded from the graduation ceremony because his dreadlocks would violate the dress code, to the Academy Awards . Cherry named Arnold and the CROWN Act in his Oscar speech. He dedicated his award to the former basketball player Kobe Bryant , who passed away shortly before the Academy Awards. This won in the award in 2018 for Dear Basketball also as Best Animated Short Film and was the first former professional athlete with an Oscar nomination and award before Matthew Cherry itself.

Academy Awards 2020

Black Reel Awards 2020

  • Award for Best Independent Short Film for Matthew A. Cherry

Television series

On July 7, 2020, an animated television series entitled Young Love was announced for the video-on-demand provider HBO Max , which will accompany the Young family from the film in twelve episodes.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d Bethonie Butler: How 'Hair Love' went from a beloved Kickstarter project to an Oscar-nominated animated short . In: The Washington Post . February 3, 2020. Accessed April 8, 2020.
  2. ^ Charles Solomon: 'Hair Love': 3 Men and a Little Girl (With a Lot of Curls) . In: The New York Times . August 29, 2019. Retrieved April 9, 2020.
  3. ↑ Miriam Di Nunzio: Matthew Cherry feels the 'Love' with Oscar win . In: Chicago Sun-Times . February 9, 2020. Accessed April 8, 2020.
  4. ↑ Oscar-winning 'Hair Love' director calls attention to efforts to ban race-based hair discrimination . In: The Washington Post . February 10, 2020. Accessed April 9, 2020.
  5. ↑ a b Dominic Patten: Sony Animation picks up 'Hair Love' short from 'Black KkKlansman' EP Matthew A. Cherry . In: Deadline . March 20, 2019. Retrieved April 9, 2020.
  6. ↑ Charles Solomon: 'Hair Love': 3 Men and a Little Girl (With a Lot of curls) . In: The New York Times . August 29, 2019. Retrieved April 9, 2020.
  7. ^ Mercedes Milligan: Lion Forge Animation Debuts with 'Hair Love' Partnership . In: Animation Magazine . August 11, 2019. Retrieved April 9, 2020.
  8. ↑ Untangling diversity in animation with Hair Love's Matthew A. Cherry . In: Animation from every Angle . November 1, 2019. Accessed April 9, 2020.
  9. ↑ Marc Snetiker: Viral animated short Hair Love to make theatrical debut with Angry Birds Movie 2 . In: Entertainment Weekly . August 5, 2019. Retrieved April 9, 2020.
  10. ↑ Travis Bean: Oscar-Nominated Short 'Hair Love' To Play Before 'Jumanji: The Next Level' . In: Forbes . January 29, 2020. Accessed April 9, 2020.
  11. ↑ Samantha Grindell, 'Hair Love' Is The Children's Book The Internet Demanded . In: Romper . March 28, 2019. Retrieved April 9, 2020.
  12. ^ Nzinga Lejeune: Hair Love: New York Times Best Selling Children's Picture Book . In: Medium . May 23, 2019. Accessed April 9, 2020.
  13. ↑ Gwen Aviles: 'Hair Love' wins Oscar for best animated short film . In: NBC News . February 8, 2020. Accessed April 9, 2020.
  14. ↑ Claudia Harmata: Hair Love director Matthew A. Cherry predicted his Oscars win years ago . In: People . February 10, 2020. Accessed April 9, 2020.
  15. ↑ Johnny Diaz and Jacey Fortin: Student Suspended Over Dreadlocks Is Invited to the Oscars . In: The New York Times . February 1, 2020. Accessed April 9, 2020.
  16. ↑ Tom Gatto: Oscars 2020: Matthew A. Cherry dedicates Academy Award for 'Hair Love' to Kobe Bryant . In: Sporting News . February 10, 2020. Accessed April 9, 2020.
  17. ↑ Chris Harnick: Matthew A. Cherry's Hair Love Getting TV Series Treatment as Young Love for HBO Max . In: E! Online . July 7, 2020. Accessed July 7, 2020.