Gina Prince-Bythewood Film Analysis

Gina Prince-Bythewood is not only a female director in Hollywood, she is also an African-American female in Hollywood, and it is clear to see how that affects her work in writing and directing. In my personal opinion she is one of the most underrated directors and screenwriters of our time due to her unique ability to combine excellent story telling with incredible directing. In all three of the films she has directed being, Love & Basketball, The Secret Life of Bees, and Beyond the Lights, she casted mostly African-American actors. When asked why there is such little diversity in Hollywood, her response really stuck out to me; she said, “Behind the camera, it makes no sense. In front of the camera, it makes no sense” (Elbert, 2014). My favorite …show more content…
However, Isham did not compose music for Love & Basketball and its rather cliché soundtrack for a film from 2000 is proof that he had nothing to do with it. It mostly consists of hip hop songs from the late 90’s, the Motown era and even a Vanilla Ice track. There is an occasional love-making song from Marvin Gaye, but for the most part the soundtrack is not impressive. Gina made a wise choice by meeting Mark Isham and asking him to compose the musical score for her next two films. In The Secret Life of Bees, he used appropriate music for the time and location the story is set in; he combined a level of classical elegance with bluegrass-y vibes to show the contrast between the worlds of the educated African Americans and the poor Caucasian farmers. He was able to turn his classical and bluegrass compositions around in Beyond the Lights. Music is fundamental to the plot due to the fact that it is about a Rihanna and Beyoncé hybrid, but he effectively depicts the music that is popular for that type of musical artist. This shows the diversity he has to create an entirely different score for an entirely different