From the South: No awards for Africans in Cannes, but new hopes

From the South: No awards for Africans in Cannes, but new hopes

No awards for Africans in Cannes, but new hopes

No awards for African cinema at the 64th Cannes film festival. This should not be surprising if we consider the participations coming from the black continent. They are indeed few but it says a lot about a new generation of directors.
Three films only were running for prices : Skoonheid by Oliver Hemanus from South Africa for the Un Certain Regard section, No more fear by Tunisian filmmaker Mourad Ben Cheikh fo the Golden Camera and the Moroccan young filmmaker Leila Kilani was in the competition of the Directors Fortnight.
New generation to take over
It is not necessarily a problem of quality of these films, but it is logic : less you have films less you have a chance to get any price.
The Tunisian film is selected more because it is about the last events in the country. It is in fact part of a tribute to the Jasmine Revolution, but since it is a debut it could run for the price of this category, the Golden Camera.
The two other filmmakers mentioned above are also young. Hermanus and Kilani presented their second features only.
This is a good sign even though none had a price. If these directors could make it and be at that level in this big festival, they still have more chance in the future to go further.
The sections where they are selected, are considered as different entrances to the official selection. It is logic that everyone needs some time to be mature. One day we will see them in the competition, like their elder African filmmakers such as Cissé, Haroun, Cissako and so on.
Highlighting the mood for revolutions
But Cannes is not only a competition. It is a huge platform for the whole world cinema. That’s why out of these participations it was talked about Africa in many other promotional events.
The first attraction was the homage given to Tunisia and Egypt. This latter was the invited country this year. It opened a new program consisting in inviting a country every year as Guest of the festival.
In addition to that, the festival wanted to give a tribute to the Egyptian revolution via a special screening of 10 shorts telling the story of the 18 days of the sit in of tahrir square (centre of Cairo) and which lead to the fall of the former president Hosni Moubarak.
Some Tunisian shorts were also screened for the same reason. Few young directors were invited to present their films in the so-called Short Film Corner, a section intended to promote short films from all over the world.
Homage’s
Two Tunisian personalities were honored at the occasion of the 64th Cannes Film Festival. These are the kind of activities organized somehow by official institutions to make their show in fact.
The first one is the Tunisian director Nouri Bouzid. He received the medal of arts and culture from the French minister of culture, Frederique Mitterrand. He succeeds to people like Sotigui Kouyate, Mustapha Alassane....
The second, Mr. Tahar Cheriaa, is a pioneer of African cinema who fought for united Africa and who passed away last November. The ceremony was organized by the International Organization of the Francophonie because he was one of its employee for many years.
He is the founder, together with Ousmane Sembene, of The Carthage Film Festival in Tunisia (1966) and the FESPACO in Burkina Faso (1969). They shared the dream of a prosperous African cinema.
During the ceremony of the homage, people could discover the portrait of the man in a documentary called Tahar Cheriaa ander the shadow of the Baobab by Tunisian photographer and director Mohammed Challouf.
The film focuses on the ideas of the man and the projects he was involved in. Via interviews and archives, it gives a complete portrait of the man and his fight for African cinema and for the whole cinema of the South.
Promotion spaces
Far away from the tributes and official ceremonies, one could meet African professionals in many spaces.
One of them is the “Village International”. It is a huge park on the very beautiful beach of the cote d’azur where delegations can set their pavilions (tents) and proceed to promote the cinema of their countries.
Few African countries used to be represented there, but the number is diminishing. You could still find the pavilion of Tunisia, Egypt, South Africa and Morocco, but there is no more Nigerian pavilion for instance.
In the Cinema of the World Pavilion, African space is also getting smaller and smaller. We used to meet more professionals from Africa when it was called Cinema of the South pavilion.
The concurrence is bigger when, in addition to south Americans, you have to face the Eastern and Central European cinemas. You can never be at the same level of competitiveness.
Few projects were selected to participate to the workshop organized by the pavilion such as Indochine trace of a Mother by Idrissou Mora Kpai from Benin, Ashes of Pardon by Gilbert Ndunga Nsangato and Jhonny Hendrix Hinestroza from Congo and Dakar Trottoirs by Hubert Laba Ndao from Senegal
The idea is that these authors can meet producers and financers to pitch their projects with a very minor hope that they get some pecuniary help.
Some others have more chance and could profit from the pavilion of the world cinema and have some screenings in the market. This is the case of the Lion’s point of view a documentary made by the Senegalese rapper Didier Awadi about the neo-colonial position of the black continent.
The Business platform
Africans come to Cannes to look for possible financial partners whereas those from other parts of the world come to sell their production and make money. There is no balance.
In the market which is the biggest part of the festival, out of 600 exhibitors only three are coming from Africa : Department of Film Services - Kenya, Film Clinic - Egypt and Sindbad Productions - Tunisia.
Other initiatives show how difficult for Africans to be part of this huge fete. That’s the challenge of the professionals from Cameroun by organizing a special event dedicated to promote the image of their country.
The minister of culture of Cameroun and a delegation of professionals like the well known Bassek Ba Kobhio, invited the world press to a presentation of their national plan called “shooting in Cameroun”. The idea is to invite productions to use the landscape of the country as shooting sets for their films.
“The government of Cameroun is willing to make all kinds of facilities to foreign productions in order to help them shooting in the most optimal conditions”, declared the minister of culture.
As for Bassek Ba Kobhio, filmmaker and director of Black Screens Film Festival, he highlighted the fact that shooting in Cameroun is an opportunity to foreign productions and it is also meant to help the local productions.
Ba Kobhio is in fact talking on behalf of all the African professionals. When African countries are not willing to take seriously the film industry and invest in it, only foreign investments are able to bring some hope to make some African films possible.
Unfortunately as far as we count on this hope, we keep on depending from the North and this is definitely not fair.
The new generation will have unfortunately to face this handicap also.

From the South: Pourquoi je suis contre l’aide internationale à la Tunisie

From the South: Pourquoi je suis contre l’aide internationale à la Tunisie

Pourquoi je suis contre l’aide internationale à la Tunisie

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FhkqN6KTtJI


Ce n’est certes pas par hasard que le Premier Ministre Tunisien (du gouvernement provisoire) s’est rendu en France pour rencontrer Nicolas Sarkozy quelques jours seulement avant le G8 de Deauville. Cela faisait partie des préparatifs du sommet dont l’une des décisions aura été l’octroie d’une aide de 14 milliards à la Tunisie et à l’Égypte pour financer le processus de transition dans lequel les deux pays sont engagés. Or, cette aide participe d’une politique internationale fondée sur le mécanisme de la « dette odieuse » qui a toujours soutenu, légitimé et renforcé les anciens régimes. Je suis donc contre cette aide à la Tunisie …
- Parce qu’il me semble qu’il y a là une contradiction insoutenable : le G8 ne veut pas changer sa politique à l’égard de ces deux pays et revoir la logique de la dette internationale, il ne peut donc aucunement être cohérent avec lui-même et soutenir le changement que leurs populations réclament ? . Le G8 n’a en effet jamais écouté les populations, il a toujours prêté oreille seulement aux régimes corrompus tant qu’ils servaient ses intérêts…
- Parce que tous les économes du monde entier le disent (et on le sait depuis Thomas Sankara qui en a payé le prix de sa vie) : la dette internationale est odieuse au sens où elle est un handicap majeur contre le développement des pays qui la perçoivent alors qu’elle est supposée les aider à progresser. C’est plutôt un investissement non équitable sous l’étiquette risible de l’aide au développement ; on prend par une main beaucoup plus que ce que l’on donne par l’autre..
- Parce qu’il est absurde de se montrer comme donateur au moment même où on demande à la Tunisie de payer une tranche de la dette contractée par l’ancien régime dont l’Occident maintenant se dissocie comme s’il na jamais été son complice ou qu’il ne l’a jamais soutenu tout en étant parfaitement à l’affut de sa corruption. Cette tranche s’élève à 411 millions de Dollars. Selon quel bon sens alors demanderait-on à un pays, dont l’économie est presque à genoux, de payer un tel montant alors qu’on estime par ailleurs qu’il a besoin d’une aide financière encore plus consistante pour pouvoir dépasser la période de transition qui le mènera vers une nouvelle ère de démocratie et de redressement économique.
- Parce que ceux qui négocient cette “aide”, en l’occurrence le premier ministre tunisien, n’est pas élu, n’est pas choisi suite à des élections démocratiques. Il est un reste de l’ancien régime avec lequel les “ forces démocratiques” les plus puissantes du monde, et donc les pays les plus riches de l’Occident, avaient pactisé pour qu’il spolie les richesses du peuple Tunisien.
- Parce qu’il est d’une contradiction absurde que de continuer à négocier avec un gouvernement qui pratique encore la censure de la presse, les arrestations des manifestants, qui refuse de traiter les dossiers de corruption impliquant les responsables de l’ancien régime, qui continue à réprimer les manifestations pacifiques par la violence à force de matraques et de bombes lacrymogènes,…
- Parce que l’Occident choisit encore la politique de l’autruche et préfère être sourd et aveugle. Il refuse encore d’écouter la voix du peuple tunisien, il ne veut pas encore être honnêtement conséquent ne serait-ce qu’avec ce que ces propres rapports secrets lui disent sur la situation réelle de ce peuple et préfère encore avoir affaire à une élite politique rien que pour qu’elle assure une forme d’ordre qui lui profite. Peu importe alors la jeunesse et ses aspirations. Peu importe le développement réel. Peu importe ce pourquoi des jeunes sont morts. Peu importe ce que la rue tunisienne dit au sujet de ce gouvernement provisoire l’accusant de trahir et sa confiance et ses aspirations révolutionnaires.
- Parce que ce qui compte au premier chef c’est d’arrêter le flux de l’émigration et de l’émigration clandestine. Ce qui compte c’est la cupidité des multinationales qui iront pomper continument et impunément l’argent des pauvres comme des sangs-sues.
- Parce la politique mondiale a les mains liées par le pouvoir des multinationales et des lobbys. Les gouvernements occidentaux ont des échéances électorales et doivent avant tout penser à se faire financer leurs compagnes. Parce qu’enfin de compte, chacun est condamné à nettoyer devant chez soi et ce qui compte d’abord ce sont les prochaines élections de chacun.
-Parce que ce qui compte c’est un pacte entre une politique internationale au service des multinationales des pays les plus puissants et une élite politique qui, soit volontairement, soit par corruption, soit encore par nécessité, contrainte à jouer le jeu du dispositif postcolonial et servir de simple outil pour le compte d’un ordre international nécessairement foireux et injuste.
- Parce qu’il est injuste que ce gouvernement français qui accueille le G8 veut encore jouer le rôle du protecteur de ce peuple tunisien. Ce même gouvernement a été surpris il n’y a pas longtemps en flagrant délit de donner un nième coup de poignard dans le dos des tunisiens en soutenant logistiquement le régime policier à réprimer les manifestants dont plusieurs perdaient la vie dans les rues tunisiennes. Et on croit réparer ce tort en paraissant dans le rôle de celui qui défend la cause de ces mêmes tunisiens auprès des créanciers qui, pire encore, ne cherchent en fait qu’à enfoncer ce pays davantage dans une dette dont il ne pourra jamais s’acquitter.
- Parce que la tutelle, on le sait depuis le protectorat de 1881[1] qui légalisait la colonisation, n’a jamais servi sinon le tuteur lui-même. Même avec l’ancien régime, le soutien était faussement hypocrite parce qu’il ne s’est jamais appuyé sur des volontés d’aide réelles mais sur des petits intérêts communs, et même de petits calculs pas trop catholiques : les élites du Sud s’enrichissaient sur le dos de leurs populations, celles du Nord sur le dos de tous le monde. Les premières sont finalement réduites au statut de petits vilains voleurs cachant les liasses de devise dans les tiroirs secrets des bibliothèques dont ils ne lisaient probablement pas les livres ; les autres se présentant faussement comme les bienfaiteurs des peuples défavorisés et les soutenants dans leurs soulèvements.

Mais je suis contre cette aide internationale à la Tunisie surtout parce qu’il ne me parait pas aussi évident que la Tunisie ait besoin, le moins que l’on puisse dire, d’une aide qui plus est si malintentionnée :
- Parce qu’une simple opération de calcul montre à quel point elle est ignoble, cette aide. Le G8 décide, «soit-disant généreusement” de débloquer 14 milliards pour la Tunisie et l’Egypte. Or, les biens des deux dictateurs déchus, Ben Ali et Moubarak et leurs familles, se trouvant pour l’essentiel en Europe, s’élèveraient à 50 milliards pour le premier et 70 pour le second. Un élève de l’école de base n’aura pas a réfléchir deux fois pour dire sans et hésitation que le compte n’y est pas.
- Parce qu’avec les 411 millions que la Tunisie est tenue de rembourser (chaque semestre s’il vous plait) à ces créanciers, qui sont essentiellement la Banque Mondiale, le Fonds Monétaire International et la Banque Européenne, le peuple tunisien pourra facilement redresser son économie au bout de deux ou trois années pas plus. Ce n’est qu’un petit pays de 11 millions d’habitants à peine.
- Parce que malgré cette dette injuste et malgré l’hémorragie économique et financière qui était due à la corruption de son élite politique, la Tunisie parvenait à un taux de développement autour de 5/6% par ans[2]. Imaginons un moment qu’après la révolution, ces deux fardeaux n’existent plus. Ce taux va tout simplement tripler. Je ne suis certes pas un économiste mais l’opération de calcul est encore une fois d’une évidence aveuglante.


________________________________________
[1] Date du début du protectorat français sur la Tunisie.
[2] Presque le même taux que celui du Brésil ou de l’Inde.

„Der Sicherheitssektor frisst sich selber auf“ Interview mit Hassouna Mansouri

Der tunesische Filmkritiker und Autor des Buches „L’image confisquée“ (2010) Hassouna Mansouri spricht in diesem Interview vom 19. Februar mit AfricAvenir in Berlin darüber, wie das tunesische Kino die „Jasmin Revolution“ vorhergesehen hatte und präsentiert dabei seine persönliche Sicht auf die Ursachen und Folgen der aktuellen Entwicklungen in Tunesien und der arabischen Welt.

http://www.africavenir.org/de/news-archiv/newsdetails/browse/weiter/datum/2011/03/04/le-systeme-securitaire-se-mange-lui-meme-interview-avec-le-critique-de-cinema-hassouna-mansouri.html?tx_ttnews%5BbackPid%5D=12&cHash=99fb2b5262b95f3221523dd10f11ae9b

Mama Africa, the paradox of the african absence

The 64th Cannes film festival is presenting two films from a Nordic country referring to Africa. Or, it is quite evidence that tow subjects can be directly connected to our continent: illegal emigration and Music.
The first film is the tragedy of our young peoples dreaming of a better life. The second is about the legendary singers and musicians who served as a standard bearer of our continent.
When the north looks to the South
That’s what the two brothers filmmakers from Finland, Aki and Mika Kaurismaki, chose to talk about. One is questioning the present; the other is trying to resuscitate the past.
The first imagines a fiction where an underage African immigrant meets a French writer in the Havre, a city in the north of France. Together, they rise against “the cold wall of human indifference” and against the “blind machinery of the Western constitutionally governed state”.
This is the story of The Havre, the finish film in the competition made the older brother Aki Kayrismaki.
As for the younger, he chose to trace the life of Miriam Makeba who was so associated to the continent that she was called Mama Africa, and this is simply the title of the documentary.
"Mama Africa" is the homage to this extraordinary and impressive artist who incarnates the voice and the hope of Africa, writes the filmmaker.
In fact everybody knows the talent and the hard fight of this woman who, in her exile, went around the world spreading wherever she performed, the deep voice of her motherland and mother continent.
When she was not on the stage, she was reading letters to the United Nations claiming her people’s rights to live free and equal.
Since 1959 she was banned from South Africa after her participation in an anti-apartheid film Come back, Africa shot secretly in her country and was a big success in Venice the same year.
When in the 1990’s Nelson Mandela, was freed and the apartheid came to its end, she went back after having received all kind of honors from all over the world and even the French nationalitie. But she went back home after more than 30 years of exile.
Your story is never better than when you tell it yourself.
It happens that the northern filmmakers are interested into Africa. But it is not sure that a lot of finish ones did. It is not bad, but…
One should admit that it is paradoxical that there is none African film in the competition but there is well place for films about Africa made by European filmmakers.
If we can understand that, in a fiction, a filmmaker is free to imagine an African character, there are few things that we can’t forgive to a documentary about an icon of our countinent like Miriam Zensi Makeba.
The filmmaker, Even if he could manage to access to a lot of archive material, seems not to know few important things about Mama Africa.
He forgets for example that she was the first black woman to win (with Harry Belafonte) a Grammy Award in 1965. It was for their album An evening with Harry Belafonte and Miriam Makeba.
He forgets also the fact that she sang also in Arabic when she was invited in a black-South African delegation to the Pan African Festival in Algiers in 1969. That’s how he doesn’t mention that she got also the Algerian citizenship from Hawari Boumedien after the Guinean nationality offered by Sekou Toure.
Doing this the documentary omits an important aspect of the fight of the Diva: she was calling for the peace in her country, but also for the unity of the whole continent.
But you need to be African to understand how important this is. But still in Cannes it is as if she is around and this is really something.


See also : Nationa Media Group
http://www.africareview.com/Arts+and+Culture/Miriam+Makeba+reappears+in+Cannes/-/979194/1164986/-/kuhm3pz/-/index.html

From the South: «Esse est percipi vel percipere »

From the South: «Esse est percipi vel percipere »

From the South: Cinema tegen fundamentalisme in Tunesië

From the South: Cinema tegen fundamentalisme in Tunesië

From the South: Death Threat in Tunis, medal in Cannes

From the South: Death Threat in Tunis, medal in Cannes



http://www.africareview.com/Arts+and+Culture/Death+threats+in+Tunis+a+medal+in+Cannes/-/979194/1163356/-/kifgc9/-/index.html

Le cinéma bat la politique

Impossible mais vrai. Jafar Panahi et Mohammad Rasoulof, choses inimaginable il y a quelques semaines, participent au festival de Cannes qui se tient du 11-22 mai 2011.
Cette présence et extraordinairement exceptionnelle après des efforts réguliers de tous les grands festival pour les soutenir et réclamer leur liberté, ne sont pas libérés mais ils sont libres. Les deux cinéastes proposent au Festival de Cannes deux films qu’ils ont pu réaliser malgré la situation kafkaïenne dans laquelle ils se trouvent : un jugement de six ans de prison ferme et vingt ans d’interdiction de toute activités professionnelles ni de contact avec les media.
D’aucun seraient tentés de s’interroger sur la manière dont les deux films sont parvenus au festival. Le plus important reste la volonté des deux cinéastes de continuer à en faire parce qu’ils savent que c’est leur raison d’être. Comment ont-ils pu tourner les films et les produire afin qu’ils soient présents à Cannes ? c’est le sens d’une volonté de fer d’une part et c’est le signe qu’ils ne sont pas seules et que certainement des collègues les ont rejoint d’une part. Mais de toute façon il faut surtout penser s’ils ont vraiment le choix.
Quelle que soit la situation, et quels que soient les éléments impliqués dans cette affaire, il reste qu’il y a un bras de fer historique entre deux volontés aussi fortes l’une que l’autre. D’une part nous avons une machine de répression et un Etat théocratique aveugle dont l’art est l’ennemi à abattre ; de l’autre des artistes qui ont appris à survivre sous la dictature et ont fait du cinéma leur vie, et la liberté d’expression l’air qu’ils respirent. La théocratie a dit son mot, l’art à travers cette présence laisse entendre sa voix malgré.
Entre deux jugements, et dans l’attente de l’appel, les deux hommes signent-là peut-être leurs derniers ouvrages. Mais ce sera peut-être aussi le geste qui les sauvera à jamais et montrera que la machine de l’oppression ne peut tenir face à une telle absurdité. Du reste, la présence de ces films et leur disponibilité pour la presse mondiale est une victoire en soi au-delà de toutes considérations.
David vaincra toujours Goliath.

Death Threat in Tunis, medal in Cannes

Every year at the occasion of the International Film Festival of Cannes, the French minister of culture gives some honorary medal to some distinguished filmmakers, actors, artists…
This year, certainly because of the revolution, it had to be a Tunisian who is going to get it. In fact, the filmmaker Nouri Bouzid was honored last Thursday by the French minister of culture Frederique Mitterrand who made him “Chevalier de la Legion d’honneur”.
Since the 70’s Nouri Bouzid was a political engage artist. He was very active and was in jail for 5 years.
During the 80’s he was one the most important filmmakers in Tunisia and in Africa and he participated many times to Cannes Film Festival.
His last film, Making of Kamikaze (2008) was a big success and is considered right now as the film of the revolution which led to the big change in Tunisia before it spread to other countries in North Africa and in the Middle East.
Death Threat,
Artists fought against dictatorship, now they have to fight against intolerance.
Few weeks ago, Nouri Bouzid received a death threat from the Tunisian Islamists. In a meeting organized by Ennahdha, an Islamist party banned by the former regime for more than 20 years because it is accused of terrorism, a young rapper on the stage mentioned explicitly his name saying that he deserves the death.
The reason of that threat is that Nouri Bouzid is a defender of secularism. This later is not atheism, but considers secularism as a personal issue and should not interfere with politics.
In his last film, he explains that Islam should not be a call for violence. But this is really what he got back, in a physical sense of the term.
Recently, after a debate about the actual context in Tunisia and the political possibilities of transition, he was aggressed in the street by a religious fanatic who hit him on his head with a bottle of glass calling: Allahou Akbar (God is Big).
Nadia Fani is another filmmaker who is facing the same kind of violence. She received on her Facebook page and by phone calls threats of death because of her new documentary No God neither Master.
Screened recently in Tunis, the documentary was made since before the revolution. It is about the ambiguous relationship people have with the religion and takes as example the fact that a lot of people don’t fasten during Ramadan (wholly month in the Islam) but they eat and drink secretly.
Earlier this year, few actresses and TV animators where attacked on Facebook in some rap clips. They were accused of not respecting the religion and insulted publically.
Debates
The revolution was made because of lack of freedom. What one could witness until now is an abuse of it. No freedom is bad but when it turns to chaos it is not that much good.
What is happening is connected to the debates taking place now in Tunisia about kind of society there should be after the fall of the old regime.
One the most complicated discussion is about secularism.
Some people think that it is separation between religion and politics. And everybody is free to have his or her own belief as a personal issue.
Others, think that Tunisia is a Muslim country and must stick to the religion as s source of it constitution.
The problem is coming from the fact that the latters consider the former ones as atheists and then should be punished or even killed.
That’s when the situation turns to violence and to a drama. Let’s hope that it doesn’t go further to a tragedy.

See also : Nation Media Group
http://www.africareview.com/Arts+and+Culture/Death+threats+in+Tunis+a+medal+in+Cannes/-/979194/1163356/-/kifgc9/-/index.html

NEW AFRICAN FILMS METHODS OF PRODUCTION AND DISTRIBUTION

Once again many persons gathered in Cannes to talk about African cinema and its difficulties. While the official selection shows only two titles one from South Africa and the other from Morocco, professionals were invited to the Cinemas of the world pavilion in the village international to make the same diagnostic of many years already: African cinema doesn’t feel good.
The topic is so general and so repetitive that one could guess already that there will be no practical solution coming out of such a meeting.
The title of the conference is: The development of new technologies offers new perspectives on African production in terms of its diffusion and visibility internationally and in its loyalty to its local public.”
This is the same tragic question that all professional are fighting to answer since years, decades even. What now? Are there any perspectives?
Mane Cisneros (Festival of Tarifa- Spain) suggested one of the new possibilities. Ibermedia is a program that could be an example to follow in Africa.
Ibermedia is a Spanish program to promote cinema and visaual arts in South America. The idea is to create a network of TV channels and impose a kind of Quota to each of them to broadcast South African films. It seems that it works why not in Africa then.
As for Kenya, Mr. Monsieur Mutie Film Commission Director, he thinks that the problem of Africans is that they look too much abroad while they should think first to local audience.
IN Kenya, he argues, there are 15 TV channels. With a minimum of broadcasting quota, there will be market big enough made of the national consumption. But this should not be only national. The whole continent should speak with the same voice.
The same idea of networking was suggested by the South African Darryl Els. He is co-founder of the independent cinema, The Bioscope in South Africa. He goes out of the mainstream circuits and finds an interesting audience for independent films.
His plan is in addition to be connected to the world network of independent cinemas, to create an African network for independent cinema, like in Uganda, Kenya, and Tanzania as a first step.
In Western Africa, there is another program of distribution. One of its promoters joined the debate. Bénédicte Boursier presented Mobiciné which is a method to bring cinema to the slums of the big African cities.
If the audience doesn’t go anymore to cinemas, they will be able to receive it wherever they are. Doing this there is a hope that piracy would step back, especially if the mobicine ticket doesn’t exceed the price of the illegal “video-booth” (300 FCFA)
The first prototype of Mobicine was presented last fespaco in Ouagadougou in March, and the cities of Bamako and Dakar are, until now the first to take the plunge.
Despite all these initiatives, the situation of film distribution in Africa is getting from bad to worse.
Still two initiatives can bring a ray of hope. The International Organization of Francophony is planned to enlarge its space of activity to involve the whole black continent not only the traditional French speaking countries.
Copying Iberiamedia, the IOF plans to push the African countries to adopt a strategy of quota to promote the local consumption of African films.
General Secretary Mr. Abdou Diouf, according to Madame Souad Hussein in charge of film department of the organization, has already sent a brief to the OUA and the African government to invite them to put this plan in their agenda.
The same idea inspired the French government. An international symposium is planned for the upcoming September. Africans and the financers of African cinema are supposed to discuss new tools to finance African cinema in this time of crisis.
Having said this, it seems that the solution is found to the decease of African cinema. Let’s don’t count our chicken before they are hatched. It is too early to be really optimist.

See also : Nationa Media Group

Apology of the glorious past

A French-American mélange kicks off the 64th Cannes Film Festival. Midnight in Paris by Woody Allen, the most French film made by an American director, was screened on Wednesday in the opening program with attendance of the author and the main cast.
Coproduced by USA and France the film is shot in Paris. It is a tribute to the city not only as a décor but also as a place where art and culture are always florescent.
However the filmmaker is not really talking about the present days. He goes back to the twenty’s via the story of an American writer who is looking for inspiration that he finds when he meets the famous artists of that time: Ernest Hemingway, Salvador Dali, Pablo Picasso, etc.
The “Mad years” (in French “Les années folles”) were indeed an epoch of cultural and intellectual effervescence. Paris was the place where to be for the most important artists of the world.
Midnight in Paris is an adaptation of Hemingway’s novel inspired by the same city that he called A Moveable Feast. A conversation is then engaged between the two artists beyond the fantasy.
It is also the story of Woody Allen himself. Gil (Owen Wilson), the protagonist is a successful Hollywood writer, but he is not feeling any satisfaction in his work for this industry. His future wife wants him to live in Malibu, but he is fascinated by the French capital where they are for vacation.
One night, after a diner with friends he is alone, drunk and lost in the streets of the city. Uninspired, and not sure about his own talent as writer, he dreams about meeting geniuses of another time.
A mysterious car from the twenty’s comes out of the darkness and stops in front of him. He gets in ends up in a feast where he meets first Ernest Hemingway, then Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald, Salvador Dali, Luis Buñuel, Henri Matisse, etc.
He is attracted by the discussions he is having with these geniuses which provide him a big inspiration. Since then his days are limited to waiting for the night. Whatever his fiancée does, doesn’t work to bring him back to the present.
At the end, he finishes his book. He is having good feelings about it, but he loses his fiancée. Is it worth it? That’s the question. Where is the truth: in the concrete reality or in the dreams?
Gil leaves the fake and bourgeois life made of artifice and stereotypes where his relation with his fiancée was leading him. He prefers the world of fantasy represented by a fauna of persons from another time. There he can enjoy a sort of poetic Delirium.
Woody Allen also leaves Hollywood for Paris. This is not the first time that the Director is working out of the USA. He was in London for Match point (2005), then in Barcelona for Vicky Christina Barcelona (2008). He is indeed well known as the most European filmmaker of America.
Still the Paris he ends up in is obviously not the one of the 2010. The Paris he is dreaming about is the city where artists where enjoying life all the time discussion the sense of poetry and ideas of films and paintings.
The question is then if it is still the same nowadays? By choosing to go back in the time, isn’t a way to him to say that Paris is not the same, and that our time is not as attracting as the glorious past.
Woody Allen confirms again that he is always an outsider. He never accepted to be in a competition in any festival. Is it because it is too real for his fantasy? But at the same time, opening a festival like Cannes is like putting him above the fray.

http://www.monitor.co.ug/LifeStyle/Entertainment/-/812796/1163094/-/4a6ekj/-/index.html

Cinema tegen fundamentalisme in Tunesië

Een van de laatste nieuwsberichten over Tunisie is over Nouri Bouzid, de beroemde filmmaker. Wij hebben in de Balie op 9 februari een clip van zijn film vertoond. Hij is door de Tunesische islamisten met de dood bedreigd. Dit is niet de eerste keer. Vroeger was het informeel, op Facebook, door onbekende personen. Maar dit keer is het publiek en met de steun van de islamitische partij Ennahdha. Nu is het een vecht/polemiek tussen hem en de genoemde partij. Dit komt omdat hij de idee van scheiden tussen religie en politiek in zijn cinema verdedigt.
Een van zijn projecten, tijdens de revolutie, was een workshop met studenten van een filmschool. Het resultaat is heel interessant. In de korte films (van 7 tot 10 minuten) zien we de atmosfeer van een paar dagen voor de 14e januari en de dagen van net daarna. Je hoort wat voor debatten in de straten van Tunis en in de media worden gevoerd, en hoe het was om de tong opeens vrij te voelen. Over welke onderwerpen discussieerden mensen? Politiek, moraal, vrijheid, media, toekomst… alles. Maar wat ik echt bijzonder vond, is dat alles is gezien door de ogen van de jeugd .
In de films kunt je zien wat er nu in Tunesië gebeurt voor de deadline van de verkiezingen van Juli waar een heel nieuwe grondwet zou worden geadopteerd. Wat kunnen we verwachten? Wordt Tunesië een voorbeeld van een echt nieuw politiek system? Waar gaat het heen? Naar een retrograde regime en een obscurantist gemeenschap of een progressieve en post-islamitische republiek?