Sharon A. Russell's Guide to African Cinema

This documentary of repressive political realities in Cameroon begins with the 1990 publication of an open letter to President Biya calling for a national conference - and the immediate arrest of the letter's author and publisher. The narration then examines the nation's colonial history, beginning with the first German missionary in 1901, the e...

Filmmaker David Achkar searches for his father, Marof Achkar, who was sent to the notorious Camp Boiro prison in 1969 for treason.

Venerable storytellers recount for the camera and their listeners the founding myths of Malagasy culture.

The French Colonel...who was forced even to torture! One of the many women...who stopped at nothing to win! The Algerian Street Boy...who became a rebel hero!

In this semi-autobiographical film, black soldiers help to defend France, but are detained in prison camp before being repatriated home.

The Ceddo people try to preserve their traditional African culture against the onslaught of Islam, Christianity, and the slave trade. When King Demba War sides with the Muslims, the Ceddo kidnap his daughter, Princess Dior Yacine, to protest their forcible conversion to Islam.

The story begins when Toby (Ivan Jackson), a young English businessman, arrives in South Africa to take charge of a publishing firm. He knows little about apartheid and so at first sees no contradiction in developing a relationship with an elite, upper-class white woman and with a woman dedicated to fighting apartheid. But as Toby makes friends ...

As World War II is going on in Europe, a conflict arises between the French and the Diola-speaking tribe of Africa, prompting the village women to organize their men to sit beneath a tree to pray.

Two teens, Tamari and Itai, are impoverished following the death of their parents when their uncle takes their plow which they need to feed themselves. While their preoccupied neighbors in the village ignore them, Itai leaves for Harare and Tamari stays behind to care for their younger brother and sister. Finally, some of the neighbors notice an...

When Serigne Ibra finally decides to get married, he declares that his future bride must not only be a ravishing beauty, but also must not have any kind of scar or blemish on her body.

Portraits of contemporary African women from four West African nations: Burkina Faso, Mali, Senegal and Benin.

Two women rebel against the traditions of a village society.

A penniless, fast-thinking musician buys a lottery ticket which he glues to his back door, in hopes of eventually retrieving his instrument from his exasperating landlady. —but the ticket wins...

Back home in Bujumbura with a Parisian diploma in his pocket and expecting to walk into a civil service job, Gito finds himself both unemployed and caught between two women: his current French girlfriend Christine and his local old flame Flora.

Albert Schweitzer (1875-1965), the mission doctor, theologian and philosopher who founded a hospital in the rainforests of Gabon, achieved sainthood in his lifetime, at least in the popular imagination. The critical assessment of his life and works in recent years, however, has been slightly more ambivalent. Ba Kobhio Bassek is the first directo...

Burial of a Christian political activist in a Muslim cemetary forces a conflict imbued with religious fervor.

The movie shows the rise and fall of a cruel and despotic village chief Guimba, and his son Jangine in a fictional village in the Sahel of Mali.

Dramaan is the most popular man in Colobane, but when a woman from his past, now exorbitantly wealthy, returns to the town, things begin to change.

This controversial political thriller, which provoked mass demonstrations and nine deaths in South Africa when it was first shown, gives dramatic form to the African National Congress's basic program of reconcilliation within a non-racialist, democratic society. A train massacre by an Inkatha militant causes the sole witness to the crime to flee...

A young African man must try every trick in the book in this attempts to win the heart of the most beautiful girl in his village.

It is an ordinary afternoon for young Mabo Keïta, at home, in Burkina Faso (West Africa). While his parents are taking a nap, he reads a schoolbook on the front porch when a stranger - an elderly man carrying his own hammock - appears for an unexpected visit. It turns out that the old man is a griot, a West African musician/entertainer whose per...

Documentary about African political leader Patrice Lumumba, who was Prime Minister of Zaire (now Democratic Republic of Congo) when he was assassinated in 1961.

A Zimbabwean widow (Jesesi Mungoshi) falls prey to her greedy brother-in-law (Dominic Kanaventi) who takes her children and belongings.

Eager to find a better life abroad, a Senegalese woman becomes a mere governess to a family in southern France, suffering from discrimination and marginalization.

Follows the story of two young boys and their adventure through the streets of Africa.

The boisterous and cheerful lives of the residents of Cameroon are barely dented by incursions of supernatural power in this humor-filled rendition of traditional folk tales in modern guise. In the story, a cheerfully naughty girl crosses paths with a witch who has the power to satisfy her curiosity about men by changing her into a young man. Sh...

In an Algerian village, the workers of a salt mine go on strike because of low wages. The owner calls the army to control the men, but a young woman cuts off the water to force the troops to retreat.

Tamsir returns to Senegal after 17 years in Europe. His uncle gives him a patronage job in Dakar, virtually without duties. He visits his family's village to see his parents, and there he meets the beautiful Lissa. Tamsir espouses traditional ways, as does Lissa, but when her parents agree to marry her off to a corrupt and well-spoken member of ...

Domingos is a member of an African liberation movement, arrested by the Portuguese secret police, after bloody events in Angola. He does not betray his companions, but is beaten to death in prison, and not knowing he is dead, his wife goes from a prison station to another, trying in vain to know where he is.

The death of a prince brings a young woman back to the palace where she was born into servitude. The lingering legacy is brought into light from behind frosted windows and velvet curtains.

In Cameroon, new schoolteacher Bernard Malo Malo is about to shake up the small village of Lebamzip. Sensitive to libertarian ideas, he doesn't hesitate to discuss politics and sexuality with his pupils. And when he suggests that the farmers form a cooperative, confrontation with the notables becomes inevitable...

Life in the African country of Mali in the 1990s is vividly highlighted in this mild drama. In the story, a young forest ranger who sees that his work holds the key to the future of his country (through reforestation) is disgusted at the short-sighted, money-grubbing ways of his superiors. He has a much better relationship with local villagers t...

After two years of absence, Saga returns to his village. His fiancee, Nogma, has become his father's second wife.

Mory, a cowherd, and Anta, a university student, try to make money in order to go to Paris and leave their boring past behind.

A tale of growing up in 1960s Senegal. Bacc narrates his early years of living in Popenguine, a town divided by culture and musical tastes.

A beautiful, intelligent and flirtatious young girl, Yonta, is secretly in love with a friend of her parents, Vicente, a hero of the war of independence. Vicente is unaware of her passion as she is of the love of a young man who sends her anonymous love letters.

A young man with dreams of pursuing a career in music moves form his small village to the capital. Along the way he falls head over heels for a woman - the same woman his boss is also pursuing for his own reasons.

At a festival, a chorus of women sing and dance as two stories unfold. In a village, a young women with a jealous husband gives him something to be jealous about when his younger brother visits from the city.

In pre-colonial times a peddler crossing the savanna discovers a child lying unconscious in the bush. When the boy comes to, he is mute and cannot explain who he is. The peddler leaves him with a family in the nearest village. After a search for his parents, the family adopts him, giving him the name Wend Kuuni (God's Gift) and a loving sister w...

A rich businessman in Senegal is cursed with crippling erectile dysfunction upon the day of his marriage to his third wife; the only cure is brutal public humiliation.

A young man with magical powers journeys to his uncle to request help in fighting his sorcerer father.

In the Mossi culture, one of the rites attending the birth of a child and its induction as a new member of the community involves the burial of the placenta. The space in which the placenta is buried is called 'Zan Boko' - a phrase which connotes the religious, cultural and affective relations that bind the child to the land and that embraces th...