Four feature films and four short films from six different African nations are part of the African Film Festival March 22-25. In addition, Ben Diogaye Beye, director of “A Child’s Love Story/Un Amour d’Enfant,” will be on hand for a discussion following his film’s screening March 25.
The festival is free and open to the public, with each screening beginning at 7 p.m. in Brown Hall, Room 100. The event is sponsored on campus by the African Students Association, the College of Arts & Sciences, and African & African American Studies and Film and Media Studies, both in Arts & Sciences.
“In Africa, filmmaking can be viewed as an offshoot from its oral storytelling traditions,” said Pier Marton, senior lecturer in Film and Media Studies. “Thus, even if the means of production or the pacing are at times very different from what we are used to, the great narrative skills often produce a most inspirational and entertaining cinema.”
This is the second year the University has hosted the festival.
“When we launched the festival last year, we had no idea what to expect, but the reception was overwhelming,” said Wilmetta Toliver-Diallo, Ph.D., an assistant dean in the College of Arts & Sciences and organizer of the festival.
Each evening offers a short film, followed by a feature.
• March 22: “My Lost Home/Ma Maison Perdue” (2001) by Kamal El-Mahouti, Morocco/France, French and Arabic with English subtitles. The filmmaker recounts his childhood memories in the wake of the destruction of a French housing project, exploring the complexly intertwined history of France and Morocco through the eyes of Moroccan immigrants living in France.
“Daughter of Keltoum” (2001), by Mehdi Charef, Algeria, Arabic with English subtitles. A young woman raised in Switzerland travels to an isolated and barren Berber settlement in Algeria’s rocky Atlas Mountains in a desperate search for her biological mother.
• March 23, “Toi, Waguih” (2005), by Namir Abdel Messeeh, Egypt/France, French and Arabic with English subtitles. The story of a relationship between a screenwriter son and his father, told through the silence of the father’s feelings about his political life.
“The Night of Truth/La Nuit de la Vérité” (2004); by Fanta Régina Nacro; Burkina Faso; Dioula, French and Moré with English subtitles. Mirroring the political strife and genocide in contemporary sub-Saharan Africa, preparations are made to end a decade of civil war in a fictitious country. The first feature film by a woman filmmaker from Burkina Faso, the film explores reconciliation and forgiveness.
• March 24: “Whole: A Trinity of Being” (2004), by Shelley Barry, South Africa. Three experimental shorts that deal with sexuality, visibility and voice from the perspective of a wheelchair user who turns the camera on herself to celebrate love and survival.
“U-Carmen Ekhayelitsha” (2005), by Mark Dornford-May, South Africa, Xhosa with English subtitles. George Bizet’s 19th-century opera “Carmen” is re-imagined in a world of pool halls, bars and courtyards in a sprawling South African shantytown. Featuring the internationally acclaimed theater company Dimpho Di Kopane, this mesmerizing story of love, jealousy and revenge forces us to question society’s standards of beauty.
• March 25: “Ousmane/Dewanati” (2006), by Dyana Gaye, Senegal/France, Wolof with English subtitles. Ousmane, a 7 year old who begs in the streets of Dakar, Senegal, decides to write a letter to Santa Claus.
“A Child’s Love Story/Un Amour d’Enfant” (2004), by Ben Diogaye Beye, Senegal, Wolof and French with English subtitles. A touching coming-of-age story of innocent love between children in Senegal set against the background of a traditional class system and economic upheaval. A talk with the filmmaker follows.
For more information, call 935-7879, visit wupa.wustl.edu/africanfilm or e-mail wtoliver@artsci.wustl.edu.