International: Africa Reviews
International Documentary Festival Amsterdam: THE CEMETERY OF CINEMA Review
Mouramani, a film by Mamadou Touré made in the mid fifties, was by all accounts the first African film shot in the French language. But nobody in Guinea seems to have seen it, as director Thierno Souleymane Diallo is finding...
MAMI WATA Review: A Singularly Enthralling Experience
Directed by CJ "Fiery" Obasi, the Nigerian film stars Rita Edochie, Uzoamaka Aniunoh, Evelyne Ily Juhen, and Emeka Amakeze.
Vlissingen 2023 Review: SIRA Survives
One of the nice surprises at the Film by the Sea Festival in Vlissingen was the unexpected warm weather, a nice little hot after-Summer. A less nice surprise was that some of the venues at the festival did not have...
ASHKAL: THE TUNISIAN INVESTIGATION Review: Riveting Supernatural Noir
If a person sets themselves alight and no one sees it, does the act lose its meaning? Is a half-built housing complex still a potential home, or a constant reminder of impermenance? Can justice be served only through the law,...
ONCE UPON A TIME IN UGANDA Review: A Love Letter to the Power of Cinema
Cathryne Czubek directed the documentary, opening this week as part of Alamo Drafthouse's Fantastic Fest Presents series.
Cannes 2023 Review: OMEN (AUGURE) Paints Kaleidoscopic Africa Here and Now
Belgian rapper Baloji's film stars Marc Zinga, Eliane Umuhire and Marcel Otete Kabeya.
Sundance 2023 Review: MAMI WATA, West African Folktale Stuns, Mesmerizes
In West African folklore, Mami Wata (“Mother Water”) represents a water-based deity of relatively recent vintage to the continent. Traditionally a life-giver and life-bringer, Mami Wata isn’t without her ambiguities, however. She can take as well as give in equal...
Sundance 2023 Review: ANIMALIA, Abstract, Metaphysical Sci-Fi Drama
For writer-director Sofia Alaoui, winning the Short Film Grand Jury Prize for Qu’importe si les bêtes meurent (So What If the Goats Die) at the Sundance Film Festival and the Best Short Film at the César Awards three years ago...
Blu-ray Review: THIS IS NOT A BURIAL, IT'S A RESURRECTION, The Poetics of Resistance
With only one or two 'big' names known, even among cinephines, cinema from sub-saharan Africa has often been neglected both on the festival and the art house cinema circuit. Perhaps also because of the way the filmmakers use the...
Toronto 2022 Review: THE ETERNAL DAUGHTER, Mirrors and Memories
It might be something bred into us when we're in the womb, a need to please our parents. Or at least, to have some kind of effect on them. The memory of how we either succeeded or failed can haunt...
Toronto 2022 Review: HOLY SPIDER, A Taut and Stark Social Thriller
It might be the world's oldest profession, but prostitution has always been treated with disdain, or far worse, depending on the society and time period. Prostiutes, who are mainly women, are both wanted and reviled; treated as though they are...
Review: In SALOUM, Rules Are Bent and Broken With Aplomb
Yann Gael, Evelyne Ily Juhen and Roger Sallah star in a thriller from Senegal, directed by Jean Luc Herbulot, and now streaming on Shudder.
Review: GOOD MADAM, Chilling Haunted House Story
Laws might change, but it can takes years, or even generations, to change a society and how it operates. What's bred in the bone cannot be easily overturned, and even as some people might techncially have the hard-fought freedom they...
Review: NEPTUNE FROST, Spiritual, Joyful, Badass Cyberpunk
The coltan mines in the hills of Burundi supply minerals that makes tantalum capacitors used in most of world's electronic devices. Multidisciplinary artist Saul Williams (Slam) and Rwandan artist Anisa Uzeyman use the mines as a springboard to embark on...
Blu-ray Review: EYIMOFE (THIS IS MY DESIRE), Intimate Lives of Quiet Longing
African filma are sorely lacking in the Criterion collection, certainly not for lack of a quality cinema. And while most cinephiles might be familiar with the term 'Nollywood', the opportunities to see films from Nigeria, or many other African nations,...
DOC NYC 2021 Review: ONCE UPON A TIME IN UGANDA, The Unlikeliest Success Story In Action Cinema
The greatest cinematic surprises often come from the unlikeliest beginnings. In the case of Cathryne Czubek's Once Upon a Time in Uganda, those beginnings are the slums of Wakaliga, Kampala, Uganda. The humble origin story of Wakaliwood and its ever...
New York 2021 Review: NEPTUNE FROST, Afrofuturist's Vision of Our Connected World
Cheryl Isheja, Bertrand Ninteretse, and Eliane Umuhire star in a spiritual, joyful lo-fi cousin of 'The Matrix' and 'Bacurau,' directed by Anisia Uzeyman and Saul Williams.The film's message might be the same here, but with more music and dancing. And it still manages to look like a badass cyberpunk film.
Toronto 2021 Review: SALOUM, A Spirited Tale of Revenge on the Senegal Delta
The Saloum Delta in Senegal is a land of cannibal myths and cursed kings. Nowhere is this more true than in Congolese director Jean Luc Herbulot's supernatural skinwalker of a film that brings West African mythology to the criminal getaway...
Toronto 2021 Review: NIGHT RAIDERS, Dystopia and Hope of the Past and Future
It can often feel in recent events that we are seeing the end of civilization as we know it (if not the end of human life all together). But too often people, especially white westerners, forget that the end of...
Toronto 2021 Review: MLUNGU WAM, The Toil of Servants, The Power of Masters
Laws might change, but it can takes years, or even generations, to change a society and how it operates. What's bred in the bone cannot be easily overturned, and even as some people might techncially have the hard-fought freedom they...
