Posts from — April 2009

In New Muslim Cool, filmmaker Jennifer Maytorena Taylor presents a look at the life of Puerto Rican American Hamza Perez over a period of a few years in Pittsburgh as he and other members of the community work to establish a Muslim community.

Born Jason, Hamza used to be a drug dealer in Massachusetts before he found Islam and turned his life around at the age of 21. Although only 83 minutes, New Muslim Cool covers many aspects of Hamza’s life: how he fits in with his (mostly) non-Muslim relatives, his marriage, his work as an activist, his hip hop career, even how he and the rest of the Muslim community deal with an uncalled for FBI raid on their mosque.

Taylor and editor Kenji Yamamoto worked well to make the film as cohesive as possible. Despite the fact that one is watching scenes that have been filmed over a few years, the documentary has an underlying theme. It’s about Hamza maturing, becoming a better person, understanding who he is, and embracing the responsibilities he feels are incumbent on him.

The great thing about New Muslim Cool is that you don’t have to be a Muslim or a convert to appreciate this film. The message given is universal and Hamza is entirely relatable. Check it out if you can. There’s one more screening in San Francisco at the Sundance Kabuki Theater on May 4 and other screenings in other parts of the country. Also, New Muslim Cool has the distinction of airing on June 23 on PBS to start off the new season of POV.

I used to play video games a lot.

In our household, we have had some sort of video game console ever since I was little. The Atari 7800 gave way to the Nintendo, which led to Sega Genesis, then Playstation, and then the XBOX. We didn’t go for the Super Nintendo, N64, or PS2 though. (Although my brother and I once rented the n64 from Blockbuster with the Star Wars game Shadow of the Empire, which was awesome by the way.)

One of my favorite games on the XBOX was Splinter Cell. I loved how it wasn’t a straight shoot-em up but a game that required strategy and patience. Ducking in the shadows, waiting for the right moment to move, being discreet while climbing fences and knocking people out (and subsequently moving the bodies to the shadows), awesome.

These past few days, I’ve been missing the Nintendo Entertainment System. I miss the simplicity of just having two buttons, A and B, that have given way to a more complicated set of buttons on video game systems of late. I miss cheat codes, which were usually a combination of something like: up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, B, A, B, A. Besides Contra, the Nintendo game I miss the most is Battletoads because I was never, ever able to pass it. I know, I know. Shock. Horror. I was unable to pass a game.
It was a pretty cool game but hard (according to Wikipedia, I wasn’t the only one to think it was hard). At one point in the game I couldn’t figure out what to do next. I seriously had no clue how to proceed from the predicament I found myself in and that’s where it ended for me.

I want another crack at it.

Alas, I don’t play video games anymore. I do have an XBOX 360, but I use it to watch DVDs. I can’t justify the hours I may potentially spend playing video games. That and how video game mentality would somehow spill over into the real world. While I was playing Splinter Cell, I would actually think at times that I had night vision goggles on me. I even had to suppress urges to climb fences. That’s not good.

I still miss it all from time to time though.

There’s this phrase that Muslims use: “Allah is the best of all planners.” If you’re not meant to do something or go somewhere, it’s not going to happen if God didn’t will it. I believe people of different faiths have something similar.

This concept was really brought home last weekend as I had so many things I needed to get to but never did. Instead, life was essentially put on hold as my family and I dealt with something personal. Although everything turned out ok, or as ok as things could possibly get under the circumstance, it still made me stop and think and think about the above phrase.

So anyways folks, even the best laid plans may never come to fruition if it’s not meant to be.

Oh, and go hug your mom.

On occasion, I review movies, books, or TV shows for Media and Islam or Illumemedia, usually things that are related to Islam. On this site, I may occasionally review a random, non-religious book or movie for fun (like the DC animated films).

I realized a while ago that I was generally positive when it came to most of these reviews. Any kind of gripe I had was always minor and I always ended up giving a review close to glowing. I wondered, was I too nice? Would I end up giving everything a positive review?

I needn’t have worried.

I was recently given an advanced copy of a book by a marketing company. This particular company gave me a free book before, which was great, so I loved that they thought of me again to send me another book.

The premise of this particular book is a controversial one: it’s a novelized version of the life of one of the wives of the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh), Aisha (ra). I was a bit hesitant to read it at first because of the fiction mixed in with the true account of religious figures, but I thought I’d be fair and not just jump to conclusions.

So I read the book. To put it simply, I didn’t like it.

As I prepare to write my review, I wonder if it’s okay to even be negative. I’m the type of person who doesn’t take criticism well so I wonder: who am I to bestow criticism on anyone else?

The first copy of the book I received was an advanced copy without the real cover, just a really simple one that characterized it as an advanced copy. The company just sent me the published version of the book and I lamented the fact that I had another version of a book I didn’t like and my bookshelf was already bursting at the seams. I looked at the published version and read through the quotes from other authors that were printed on the front and back covers. The headlining quote was from Amy Tan and it was then I realized: I have my own opinion and I’ll go ahead and give it. People will like
the book and some people won’t and I happen to fall into the latter group. If you don’t want something to be critiqued don’t put it out there. And if by some crazy chance the author happens to read my review, he can take solace in the fact that other people liked it and what do I know because I’m no Amy Tan.

I just feel a bit bad because this will probably be the last time that this marketing company gives me a free book.