A soon-to-be-aired documentary feature, ‘The Eyes of Ghana’ produced by two-time Oscar winning filmmaker Ben Proudfoot, is about to shine the spotlight on 93 year-old Chris Hesse, the personal cinematographer of Ghana’s first President and revolutionary African leader Kwame Nkrunah.
While filming a project for UNICEF in Ghana, Canadian filmmaker Ben Proudfoot was introduced to legendary Ghanaian documentarian Chris Hesse by award-winning journalist and co-producer Justice Baidoo. At the time, Hesse was 90 years old and shared with Proudfoot the existence of his secret archive of over 1,000 reels capturing Africa’s liberation era. Moved by the significance of the collection, Hesse request to Proudfoot for help in preserving and digitising the historic footage, laying the foundation for what would become ‘The Eyes of Ghana’.
Ben Proudfoot also teamed up with Oscar-nominated director Moses Bwayo and former American President Barack Obama and his wife Michelle who are currently putting the finishing touches on ‘The Eyes of Ghana’, which details the rise and fall of Nkrumah – that towering figure of African history who inspired the liberation of the continent in the 1950s and 1960s.
The documentary follows Nkrumah works as Ghana’s first President, a political theorist and prominent African leader who was significantly featured on the cover of Time magazine in 1953.
Nkrumah was later toppled by a military coup in 1966, which was allegedly backed by the CIA, after he was cast as a dictator. As a result, the films made during Nkrumah’s time were ordered to be burned. Though his name is all but erased in the U.S., Nkrumah remains an iconic and revered figure across much of Africa.
The post MICE CAFE: Obamas are co-producers on ‘the eyes of Ghana’: Documentary unearthing 93-year-old Hesse’s archive from Africa’s liberation era appeared first on The Business & Financial Times.
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