By Yaa Mensah-King

“I believe in America.” The first time I heard this line, I was 16, and at that moment, I couldn’t help but agree. I had just started watching movies to pass the time after finishing my IGCSEs; I had discovered that I enjoyed it quite a bit. The time after IGCSEs is one when most people my age start seriously thinking about their future career paths, and when I started considering film. Part of my research was looking up what were the “best” movies of all time, and that’s how Francis Ford Coppola’s The Godfather ended up on my watchlist.

How I felt about The Godfather’s opening line — uttered by the character Amerigo Bonasera — had nothing to do with an actual fondness for the country. I’d witnessed all the violence exacted by the United States, domestically and internationally, from a very young age. It was more to do with how I envisioned my future at that time. Most of the searches about film school and careers in film gave results that were based in the United States. There are, of course, a number of reasons for this: my search engine is made by an American company; virtually, all my searches are in English; most articles that come up are written by Americans. So, on some level, it makes sense why the majority of my search results were centered around the United States. I am not going to fault Americans for talking about American media.

American media is pervasive. There is only one major cinema company in my country, with three branches total, and it happens to predominantly screen American blockbusters. The company in question is based in South Africa, yet it primarily shares American work at the expense of local and regional talent. Throughout my whole life, I have only heard of one local film being screened; that is where my problem arises. I’m not anti-American, but why can’t non-American media be shared as expansively as its American counterparts?

It’s extremely dangerous for an industry — film in particular — to be completely dominated by one country. It significantly narrows the audience’s worldview, as there’s a high chance for American filmmakers to set their films in their own country. And, when they do expand their settings into different places, they often fall into the trap of stereotyping. As a result, American audiences are presented with a limited view of the world, in which they are portrayed to be at the very center. Everyone and everything else falls into the background: The Global South becomes a yellow filtered hellhole with nothing to offer but abject poverty. Eastern Europe becomes a desaturated, grey world where nothing grows but misery. Only the United States — and at times, the rest of the West — are represented in ways that feel real. America becomes the epitome of what civilized nations should look like.

It’s this specific portrayal that propagates the harmful myth of American exceptionalism, which has been one of the major contributing forces of American imperialism. It also negatively affects non-American audiences, as it leads to a belief that the American way is the right way. Thus, impressionable people, especially adolescents, abandon their unique cultures for an idealized “American culture.” In my country, teenagers closely follow American trends. English is the default language for many, which is understandable as we were colonized by the British, but many have adopted American accents. Even popular music is mostly from America. Any trace of Indigenous cultures that persisted after our country’s independence are nowhere to be found among young people. Even in their art — be it music, painting or writing — their culture is not reflected. They have become Americanized, and their children will most likely be raised in the American fashion.

Class and socio-economic positions definitely play a role in this. The majority of the young people I’m referring to — which I, myself, am a part of — were raised middle class, if not higher. The more Americanized you are, the more wealth you are signaling. So, even though some young people have retained their cultures, they often elevate this American ideal, because they too “believe in America.”

However, as much as non-Americans want to assume a more American identity, they will never be American. I’ve witnessed this process firsthand. America will never truly accept them or their children. They will likely be bombarded with questions like, “Where are you really from?” should they emigrate to the United States. When they come to this realization (and there are some who don’t), they will be so far alienated from their original culture; because of it, they face a conflict of identity that spans a lifetime. Whether the United States or their original cultures are centered, they will be doomed to tread the circumference of both — all because they were fed a very narrow view of what the world is, and what it could be.

In Stanley Kramer’s 1960 film, Inherit the Wind, a character named Henry Drummond says, “The Bible is a book. It’s a good book, but it is not the only book.” In a similar way, American films are good films, but they are not the only ones that exist. It is impossible to gain a true understanding of a particular culture from the mouth of someone who does not belong to it.

I decided that I wanted to become a filmmaker after watching Pedro Almodóvar's Pain and Glory and Bong Joon-ho’s Parasite. The films are drastically different, but what made them stand out to me was the reclamation of one’s own narrative. In the American films I’d watched before, Spain and South Korea were always “othered” places. I never stopped to consider that, even though the story of whatever film I was watching was based in America, it was not the only story. There was a wealth of stories in those places, even though they were only mentioned in passing, and they would be easier for me to identify with. The country where I’m from is hardly ever mentioned in passing, yet there are so many stories here. There are stories from Mexico, from Iran, from Brazil, and many more. Instead of hearing about how they play a part in American stories, it’s important to hear their own individual stories.

Our stories, as non-Americans, deserve to be given as loud a voice as the American ones. For so long, our voices have been unjustly drowned on the world stage and in our own countries. However, I believe Gen Z is more receptive to media that isn’t made or told from locations in their immediate vicinity. Most of us live on the internet now, and don’t have to worry about the tyranny of borders. ♦

Why not check out films from as many places as you can? You’re not obligated to like every foreign film, but it is extremely beneficial to explore themes and subjects from different perspectives. If you’re like me, and enjoy films that delve into the psychological and a fair amount of horror, I have made a Letterboxd list here.

What About US: A Life Suffocated by American Media

By Yaa Mensah-King