Multicultural Curtain Call : Films: Ayuko Babu hopes the Pan African Festival will help rebuild hope in riot-scarred L.A.

By ROBERT EPSTEIN

Oct. 14, 1992 12 AM PT

Babu, in Swahili, translates as elder . . . father . . . grandfather.

Ayuko Babu of Cheyenne, Wyo., and Los Angeles is neither elderly nor African born. But on Thursday night, Babu becomes a Hollywood godfather.

While 48-year-old Babu is not exactly a show-business insider, he is the man in charge of another of those uniquely L.A. cultural pursuits--a film festival with a splashy opening night, a Sunset Boulevard address, star hosts such as Danny Glover and Whoopi Goldberg, even a visiting first lady (Chantal Compaore of Burkina Faso), plus some authentic, certified show-business insiders.

The weeklong event is called the Pan African Film Festival, a collection of 40 films by black directors on four continents. Yet beyond the opening night glitter and its great, brave hopes, there are certain realities the festival faces: Where are its target audiences? What is its appeal? Who will go? Can its specific focus work in this city’s multicultural settings?

Ayuko Babu thinks he knows some of the answers. The others come not as certainly.

It’s taken a few years, but Babu and his organization have what he hopes will be an annual festival, a spinoff by name of the festival held annually in Burkina Faso. Pan African here refers to black filmmakers everywhere--Africa, Europe, the Caribbean, Latin America, the United States, people of and from African families.

Babu has never produced a festival before and as a financial consultant and small-film distributor he has no special entree to Hollywood.

But then he didn’t know much about putting on dance concerts, and there he was in Pasadena during the 1984 Olympics working with the touring Ballet Africain from Guinea. And he didn’t know much about setting up special events, but there he was at the Coliseum two years ago helping with the Los Angeles visit of South Africa activist Nelson Mandela.

And there he will be Thursday night and the next seven days and nights at the new Laemmle Sunset 5 on Sunset Boulevard, with an ambitious, unprecedented schedule of films from 30 countries, including the English-language prize-winning film “Heritage Africa” from Ghana and two by U.S. directors.

The festival is partly inspired by Jamaica’s Sunsplash Festival of new and unknown reggae musicians--a weeklong celebration of music followed by an extensive U.S. and European tour.

Babu sees a parallel: The same could be done for black filmmakers. A film festival in Hollywood, followed by tours to other cities, perhaps even a series on PBS. But first there’s the matter of finding his first audiences.

While most film festivals promote something (tourism to cities, states or nations) or sell something (new movies), this festival is shaping up as a showcase for what Babu calls the human spirit. But there’s also a clear nod to the commercial.

It’s OK to rebuild the physical Los Angeles, Babu says, but don’t forget to rebuild human aspirations, dreams and desires. New malls are OK. But something human has to go upward, too. Self-esteem can be generated by seeing the world and the works of other peoples.

“A person’s spirit is more important than another building or a food chain store in a burned-out area. We have to feed human hopes, too. Films can do that. They have done that,” he says.

He knows something about feeding hope. As a Los Angeles college student in the post-Watts riot period, he was active with community organizations, pushing for grass-roots empowerment rather than development and political campaigns.

The idea of the film festival--half of the films scheduled have never been screened in the United States and almost none have been shown in Southern California--dates back to the Los Angeles Olympics when Babu, then a financial consultant for African trade working with Ballet Africain, was asked by Guinean government representatives how to promote African filmmakers. A similar question came from the government of Burkina Faso, one of the poorest countries in the world yet one that spends up to $5 million each year on film studies and the largest festival of African films.

Babu’s answer: a showcase festival, maybe two of them. First, he thought, try one in Hollywood. That would get the attention of the movie crowd and would stimulate international interest. Then, try Washington that would draw in the political community.

But, first, Los Angeles.

“Most film distributors,” he says, “don’t think much of the market for African films. They may not be familiar with the work or think there is an audience for it. Most American blacks are unfamiliar, too, with the movies. It’s hard enough to get any foreign films shown here. So we decided the distributors had to be convinced. A showcase would do that.”

While specific planning by the festival’s board and its largely volunteer staff only started about a year ago, the Los Angeles riots pushed matters along.

Then last month when Mayor Tom Bradley handed out $210,000 in Los Angeles Arts Recovery Funds, the Pan African Film Festival received one of the larger grants, a needed $3,000. The non-profit festival itself is budgeted at $135,000, supported largely by corporate and individual grants and local black organizations.

“When the uprisings occurred,” Babu says, “the whole issue of what to do to respond became clear but no one was talking about culture. So we said include the creative in the city’s agenda, do something about spirit and self-esteem and not just focus on business. What we were talking about was what no one was dealing with.

“The riots kicked us forward.”

Basic to this festival--beyond the range of the films themselves--will be free, corporate-sponsored afternoon screenings for junior and senior high students and a seminar Saturday by black film technicians on job opportunities. The young people are part of the audience Babu hopes to attract. But what really will count is attendance at the nightly screenings in two of the five theaters. A 60% turnout in the 280- and 163-seat theaters would be successful by film-festival standards.

“Festivals usually don’t make money,” says Babu. “At best, they break even. Also at best, we might get some distribution deals, connect with some people who never knew these films were available.

“But for audiences, festivals are magic things, seven days in which you experience something different from what you normally get a chance to see. The films can touch your senses. You can become a better person.”

One of only 1,000 blacks in Cheyenne and of a handful at Cheyenne High, Babu learned early that the world was more than the restricted working-class life of Cheyenne. Some of those lessons came from his high school basketball coach, Jim Story, who doubled as an accounting teacher. In the mornings the coach “hassled” him about math and in the afternoons he taught the discipline and organization that come from sports.

“We learned how to lose in games and how to come back,” he says. “As juniors our team was a loser. As seniors we were champions.”

Films expanded him, he says. In Cheyenne he thought most whites were of a type. Then movies showed him whites as World War II Nazis as well as Audie Murphy-like heroes. When he first came to Los Angeles, a film, “Black Orpheus” from Brazil, showed him for the first time what black life was outside of the United States, another part of what he calls “the culture of the African diaspora.”

Babu took his weeklong film festival to the Sunset Strip for good reason. It’s a new theater complex, he says, and “a first-class environment. It gives an aura of legitimacy to what we are doing. And even if it borders West Hollywood, it says Hollywood to the world.”

He’s been working the radio talk-show circuit--generally black stations--trying to build interest, hitting community organizations, talking it up whenever he can, getting mailings out.

He is striving for greater outreach, too. His organization is offering seats to Asian--particularly Korean--groups and Latinos. He’s concerned, though, about not reaching what he calls “the white working class. They need to see these films more than the upper- and middle-class whites who are familiar with foreign films. The white working class gets left out so much. What organization speaks to their needs?”

Then he reflects.

“The issue really is: How do you plug in to everyone’s needs?”