By Michael Atkinson
The seminal will behind everything that matters about sub-Saharan African cinema, and at the same time the world's most guileless filmmaker, Ousmane Sembene was virtually a one-man continental film culture for 40 years, establishing the cinematic syntax and priorities for an entire section of mankind, and its relationship with movies. From the first mini-feature, "Borom Sarret" (1964) to the last, vibrant, polemical film "Moolaadé" (2004), Sembene's work aches with sociopolitical austerity . as an artist, he's virtually style-free, almost unprofessional, but possessed of a voice as clear and uncomplicated as sunlight. Primal, unsophisticated experiences, the films are simple but never simplistic, lowbrow but unsensational, fastidiously realistic and yet unconcerned with sustaining illusion. His filmography is more or less divided between cool, undramatic autopsies on post-colonial norms and folly (1966's "Black Girl," 1968's "Mandabi," 1974's "Xala") and demi-epics of colonial horror (1971's Emitai, 1977's "Ceddo," 1987's "Camp de Thiaroye"). The slow burn,...
The seminal will behind everything that matters about sub-Saharan African cinema, and at the same time the world's most guileless filmmaker, Ousmane Sembene was virtually a one-man continental film culture for 40 years, establishing the cinematic syntax and priorities for an entire section of mankind, and its relationship with movies. From the first mini-feature, "Borom Sarret" (1964) to the last, vibrant, polemical film "Moolaadé" (2004), Sembene's work aches with sociopolitical austerity . as an artist, he's virtually style-free, almost unprofessional, but possessed of a voice as clear and uncomplicated as sunlight. Primal, unsophisticated experiences, the films are simple but never simplistic, lowbrow but unsensational, fastidiously realistic and yet unconcerned with sustaining illusion. His filmography is more or less divided between cool, undramatic autopsies on post-colonial norms and folly (1966's "Black Girl," 1968's "Mandabi," 1974's "Xala") and demi-epics of colonial horror (1971's Emitai, 1977's "Ceddo," 1987's "Camp de Thiaroye"). The slow burn,...
- 3/25/2008
- by Michael Atkinson
- ifc.com
CANNES -- Sembene Ousmane, the 81-year-old father of Senegalese cinema if not African cinema itself, directly confronts the scourge of female genital mutilation in "Moolaade".
In portraying the revolt of women against the practice of circumcision in one tiny backward village, he lays out the nature of the conflict: Men clinging to the ancient tradition, supported in their minds by religion, come up against not only wives no longer willing to expose daughters to the life-endangering practice but the condemnation of educated men and women, who view the ritual as barbarous.
Ousmane, who wrote and directs, gives strong flavors to his characterization of village life and its peoples. But as drama the film mostly serves to illustrate the two sides of this crucial social debate in Africa. More festival dates are a cinch, but theatrical exposure may not go much beyond a few high-end art houses.
The heroine is Colle Ardo Gallo Sy (Fatoumata Coulibaly), a woman who somehow shielded her only daughter from the ritual of "purification" organized every seven years. In the next go-round, four young girls flee and seek protection or "moolaade" from Ardo in her compound.
Thus, the ancient tradition of asylum collides with the equally old tradition of female circumcision. The film settles into a stalemate between male village elders, who stubbornly insist Ardo drop the moolaade, and the woman who refuses.
Her husband is a weak man under the thumb of a meddling elder brother. Another male character, the son of the king who has returned from studies abroad, is more puzzling. Presumable exposed to more enlightened thinking, he nevertheless fails to take the woman's side until it is too late at least for one of the girls.
The arguments contain much repetition and not enough examination of the attitudes on both sides. You do wonder how Ardo did manage to keep her own daughter from purification.
Thirty-eight of the 54 member states of the African Union still practice female mutilation. That an African artist such as Ousmane speaks out so strongly against the ritual is enormously helpful. Unfortunately, Africa is a continent with few cinemas.
Technical credits are solid.
In portraying the revolt of women against the practice of circumcision in one tiny backward village, he lays out the nature of the conflict: Men clinging to the ancient tradition, supported in their minds by religion, come up against not only wives no longer willing to expose daughters to the life-endangering practice but the condemnation of educated men and women, who view the ritual as barbarous.
Ousmane, who wrote and directs, gives strong flavors to his characterization of village life and its peoples. But as drama the film mostly serves to illustrate the two sides of this crucial social debate in Africa. More festival dates are a cinch, but theatrical exposure may not go much beyond a few high-end art houses.
The heroine is Colle Ardo Gallo Sy (Fatoumata Coulibaly), a woman who somehow shielded her only daughter from the ritual of "purification" organized every seven years. In the next go-round, four young girls flee and seek protection or "moolaade" from Ardo in her compound.
Thus, the ancient tradition of asylum collides with the equally old tradition of female circumcision. The film settles into a stalemate between male village elders, who stubbornly insist Ardo drop the moolaade, and the woman who refuses.
Her husband is a weak man under the thumb of a meddling elder brother. Another male character, the son of the king who has returned from studies abroad, is more puzzling. Presumable exposed to more enlightened thinking, he nevertheless fails to take the woman's side until it is too late at least for one of the girls.
The arguments contain much repetition and not enough examination of the attitudes on both sides. You do wonder how Ardo did manage to keep her own daughter from purification.
Thirty-eight of the 54 member states of the African Union still practice female mutilation. That an African artist such as Ousmane speaks out so strongly against the ritual is enormously helpful. Unfortunately, Africa is a continent with few cinemas.
Technical credits are solid.
CANNES -- Sembene Ousmane, the 81-year-old father of Senegalese cinema if not African cinema itself, directly confronts the scourge of female genital mutilation in "Moolaade".
In portraying the revolt of women against the practice of circumcision in one tiny backward village, he lays out the nature of the conflict: Men clinging to the ancient tradition, supported in their minds by religion, come up against not only wives no longer willing to expose daughters to the life-endangering practice but the condemnation of educated men and women, who view the ritual as barbarous.
Ousmane, who wrote and directs, gives strong flavors to his characterization of village life and its peoples. But as drama the film mostly serves to illustrate the two sides of this crucial social debate in Africa. More festival dates are a cinch, but theatrical exposure may not go much beyond a few high-end art houses.
The heroine is Colle Ardo Gallo Sy (Fatoumata Coulibaly), a woman who somehow shielded her only daughter from the ritual of "purification" organized every seven years. In the next go-round, four young girls flee and seek protection or "moolaade" from Ardo in her compound.
Thus, the ancient tradition of asylum collides with the equally old tradition of female circumcision. The film settles into a stalemate between male village elders, who stubbornly insist Ardo drop the moolaade, and the woman who refuses.
Her husband is a weak man under the thumb of a meddling elder brother. Another male character, the son of the king who has returned from studies abroad, is more puzzling. Presumable exposed to more enlightened thinking, he nevertheless fails to take the woman's side until it is too late at least for one of the girls.
The arguments contain much repetition and not enough examination of the attitudes on both sides. You do wonder how Ardo did manage to keep her own daughter from purification.
Thirty-eight of the 54 member states of the African Union still practice female mutilation. That an African artist such as Ousmane speaks out so strongly against the ritual is enormously helpful. Unfortunately, Africa is a continent with few cinemas.
Technical credits are solid.
In portraying the revolt of women against the practice of circumcision in one tiny backward village, he lays out the nature of the conflict: Men clinging to the ancient tradition, supported in their minds by religion, come up against not only wives no longer willing to expose daughters to the life-endangering practice but the condemnation of educated men and women, who view the ritual as barbarous.
Ousmane, who wrote and directs, gives strong flavors to his characterization of village life and its peoples. But as drama the film mostly serves to illustrate the two sides of this crucial social debate in Africa. More festival dates are a cinch, but theatrical exposure may not go much beyond a few high-end art houses.
The heroine is Colle Ardo Gallo Sy (Fatoumata Coulibaly), a woman who somehow shielded her only daughter from the ritual of "purification" organized every seven years. In the next go-round, four young girls flee and seek protection or "moolaade" from Ardo in her compound.
Thus, the ancient tradition of asylum collides with the equally old tradition of female circumcision. The film settles into a stalemate between male village elders, who stubbornly insist Ardo drop the moolaade, and the woman who refuses.
Her husband is a weak man under the thumb of a meddling elder brother. Another male character, the son of the king who has returned from studies abroad, is more puzzling. Presumable exposed to more enlightened thinking, he nevertheless fails to take the woman's side until it is too late at least for one of the girls.
The arguments contain much repetition and not enough examination of the attitudes on both sides. You do wonder how Ardo did manage to keep her own daughter from purification.
Thirty-eight of the 54 member states of the African Union still practice female mutilation. That an African artist such as Ousmane speaks out so strongly against the ritual is enormously helpful. Unfortunately, Africa is a continent with few cinemas.
Technical credits are solid.
- 5/16/2004
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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