PROGRAM NOTES AND RESOURCES
2004
WEEK I:
AMANDLA! A REVOLUTION IN FOUR-PART HARMONY ( South Africa, 2002, 103 min.), directed by Lee Hirsch. We open our 14th Festival with this awe-inspiring tribute to those who struggled against—and finally triumphed over--the repressive forces of apartheid in South Africa. At the heart of the struggle was the unifying, community-building power of music. This film focuses on those whose music sparked and sustained the liberation effort. The film resounds with songs that are both uplifting and enormously enjoyable, as well as interviews with many of the artists that produced them, often at great sacrifice. Nine years in the making, Amandla! won both the Documentary Audience Award and the Freedom of Expression Award at the 2002 Sundance Film Festival. In English and Zulu with English subtitles.
Friday, February 6, 7:00 and 9:30 p.m. , McMenamins Kennedy School Theatre, 5736 NE 33 rd Ave.Also That Evening: Celebration of African culture with an African Marketplace at the Kennedy Scholo, 7-10 p.m.
ALI ZAOUA, PRINCE OF THE STREETS ( Morocco, 2000, 90 min.), directed by Nabil Ayouch. Ali, Kwita, Omar, and Boubker are “chemkaras,” kids living in the streets of Casablanca , glue-sniffers and dreamers. As the film opens, they have broken away from the gang of pickpockets led by Dib, a decision that immediately results in the death of young Ali, their leader. His crew decides that Ali, though struck down like a piece of garbage, will be buried like a prince. They will succeed, against all odds. And against all odds this remarkable film manages to take a setting steeped in hopelessness, made with real street kids, and suffuse it with poetry and psychological complexity. Winner of a number of international awards, Ali Zaoua was Morocco’s submission to the Academy Awards. In Arabic with English subtitles.
Saturday, February 7, 7:30 p.m., Terrell Hall, Room 122, PCC Cascade Campus.
WEEK II:
HEREMAKONO/WAITING FOR HAPPINESS( Mauritania, 2002, 95 min.), directed by Abderrahmane Sissako. By the director of Life on Earth (1998), which was shown at CFAF 10 in 2000, Waiting for Happiness is the semi-autobiographical story of an individual stuck between trains on his life’s journey. Born in Mauritania but raised in Mali, Abdallah returns to his native country to stay with his mother in the coastal town of Nouadhibou, while he awaits the opportunity to move on to Europe. The sea, with its vision of a future free from his African past, beckons on one side; the great expanse of the Sahara lies waiting on the other. Estranged from his surroundings--he cannot speak the local language—Abdallah (and we) can only watch, and gradually learn a different kind of happiness. The beautifully filmed Waiting for Happiness won the Grand Prize at the 2003 FESPACO (the world’s foremost festival of African film, held in Burkina Faso every other year) and the FIPRESCI (International Press) award at the 2002 Cannes Film Festival. In French and Hassanya with English subtitles.
Thursday, February 12, 12:00 p.m., and Friday, February 13, 7:30 p.m., Terrell Hall, Room 122, PCC Cascade Campus.
ABOUNA/OUR FATHER ( Chad, 2002, 84 min.), directed by Mahamat-Saleh Haroun. By the director of Bye Bye Africa, shown at CFAF 11 in 2001, this film takes a familiar situation—the father who abandons his family—and tells it from the perspective of the sons that he has left behind. Fifteen-year-old Tahir and 8-year-old Amine try to discover where he is, why he has gone away, and finally why he is “irresponsible.” Their efforts get them into trouble and more trouble, threatening to break up what remains of their family, yet creating a very special relationship between the two boys. Lovingly photographed, Abouna won the award for best cinematography at the 2003 FESPACO. In Chad Arabic with English subtitles.
Thursday, February 12, 1:30 p.m., and Saturday, February 14, 7:30 p.m., Terrell Hall, Room 122, PCC Cascade Campus.
Thursday Evening Documentary Series
BENJAMIN AND HIS BROTHER (Sudan/UK/U.S.A., ), directed by Arthur Howes.
During CFAF 11 we showed two films by British filmmaker Arthur Howes, Nuba Conversations (1989) and Kafi’s Story (1999). Benjamin and His Brother is the third of his trilogy of films dedicated to his long-suffering friends among the Nuba people of Sudan. Benjamin and His Brother focuses on two of “The Lost Boys” of Sudan, the 20,000 Southern Sudanese who survived the long, arduous journey on foot from Sudan to Ethiopia, and then on to Kenya. Throughout this ordeal, Benjamin and William Deng clung to each other, and to their dreams of a life free from disruption and privation, a life where they can mine “the gold called Education.” Now, because of a bureaucratic screw-up, William is on a plane to Houston and Benjamin is left behind in the Kakuma refugee camp in Kenya. How they cope is the subject of this remarkable film, a story about dreams shattered, and dreams renewed.
Thursday, February 12, 7:30 p.m. , Terrell Hall, Room 122, PCC Cascade Campus.
WEEK III:
NDEYSAAN/THE PRICE OF FORGIVENESS ( Senegal, 2002, 90 min.), directed by Mansour Sora Wade. Imbued with the essence of traditional oral literature, Ndeysaan is set in the coastal village of Timberling, among the Lébou people of southwestern Senegal. Mbanick and Yatma have been life-long friends, but their friendship is falling apart. Mbanick is one of those mythic figures born under a lucky star. He is destined to succeed his father as the village’s marabout (a traditional Muslim healer/magician) and to win the love of the beautiful Moxoye. Yatma becomes increasingly mad with jealousy, a jealousy that leads to epic conflict, pain, and the quest for redemption. But what exactly will be the price of forgiveness? Beautiful and thought-provoking, Ndeysaan won the Best Music award at FESPACO 2003 for Wassis Diop. In Lébou with English subtitles.
Thursday, February 19, 12:00 p.m., and Saturday, February 21, 7:30 p.m., Terrell Hall, Room 122, PCC Cascade Campus.
Thursday Evening Documentary Series
IMPERFECT JOURNEY (Ethiopia, 1994, 88 min.), directed by Haile Gerima, with Ryszard Kapuscinski. Famed Ethiopian director Haile Gerima left his native city of Gondor while still a young man, eventually moving to Los Angeles to study film at UCLA and then to make films of his own (including Sankofa, Harvest 3,000 Years, Adwa, all of which have been shown at CFAF). During his absence, his country suffered through the collapse of the Sellassie regime and the nightmare years of dictatorship and war that followed. Following the removal of the Derg from power in 1991, Gerima was commissioned by the BBC to return to record the condition of his people and give a sense of the new Ethiopia . Together with Polish journalist Ryszard Kapuscinski, he journeyed from Gondor to the capital Addis Ababa , filming and speaking with people along the way. What emerges is the kind of penetrating social analysis that one expects from Gerima (a featured filmmaker at CFAF 10 and 13), as well as deep respect for his compatriots, who have managed to maintain their dignity and sense of history despite years of profound hardship and loss. In English and Amharic with English subtitles.
Thursday, February 19, 7:30 p.m., Terrell Hall, Room 122, PCC Cascade Campus.
LITTLE SENEGAL (Algeria/Senegal, 2001, 97 min.), directed by Rachid Bouchareb. CFAF veterans will remember Sotigui Koyaté as the griot in the excellent film Keïta, a memorable and indeed extraordinary performace. Here he plays a guide at the Gora Island slave fort museum near Dakkar, who decides that he must travel to the U.S. in search of the descendants of his relatives who were seized and taken over the sea. He winds up in the Little Senegal section of Harlem, encountering one problem after another. This film places the complex and often difficult relationship between Africans and African-Americans front and center, presenting it mainly through African eyes. Both in the grace and power of its acting and in the force of its subject matter, Little Senegal is indeed a very special movie. In English, along with French and Arabic with English subtitles.
Friday, February 20, 7:30 p.m., Hollywood Theatre, 4122 N.E. Sandy Blvd.
Family Film Day
NIGHTJOHN(U.S.A., 1996, 92 min.), directed by Charles Burnett. We are pleased to present as our Family Film Day feature this powerful film by celebrated African-American filmmaker Charles Burnett (Killer of Sheep, To Sleep with Anger). It is set in the U.S. during the height of slavery, a time when African slaves were deliberately kept illiterate; in fact, any slave teaching another how to read would be subjected to the most violent punishment. But this doesn’t stop the man known as Nightjohn from teaching a young girl named Sarny how to read and write. However, Sarny, who narrates the film, will come to learn—and to share with us—much more than just reading and writing. This is not a film for young children (it is rated PG-13), but it is a film that older children (and adults) will enjoy and will remember. In English. In between the two screenings of Nightjohn, we will have traditional African storytelling by Malian artist and griot Baba Wagué Diakité.
Saturday, February 22, 11:30 a.m., and 2:30 p.m. Storytelling by Baba Wagué Diakité, 2-2:30 p.m. McMenamins Kennedy School Theatre, 5736 NE 33 rd Ave.
In Honor of the Bicentennial of Haitian Independence
MAN BY THE SHORE/L’HOMME SUR LES QUAIS (Haiti, 1993, 106 min.), directed by Raoul Peck. By the director of the powerfully memorable Lumumba (CFAF 12), this film brings us to Peck’s native Haiti in the 1960s, through a series of flashbacks, fragmented memories of a woman named Sarah, who was a young girl at the time. It is the time of the repressive rule of François “Papa Doc” Duvalier and his brigade of thugs, the Tontons Macoutes. Young Sarah, whose parents have fled to the countryside, comes gradually to understand—as do we—the horrors of the times in which she lives. But under Peck’s subtle hand, the film gives us poetry and insight, rather than simple labels and the promise of simple solutions. In French and Creole with English subtitles.
Thursday, February 26, 12:00 p.m., Terrell Hall, Room 122, PCC Cascade Campus,and Friday, February 27, 7:30 p.m., Hoffman Hall Auditorium, Portland State University.
A SUMMER IN LA GOULETTE (Tunisia, 1996, 100 min.), directed by Férid Boughedir. The director of the wonderful Halfaouine (CFAF 11) brings us another lovely film set in the Tunisia of his memories. In the seaside resort of La Goulette three young women are inseparable friends, despite the fact that one is Muslim, one Jewish, and one Catholic. They and their families live in a working-class community where religion is secondary to neighborliness, and everything is subordinate to the fathers’ commitment to keeping their daughters’ virginity intact. So when the girls vow to give up their virginity by August 15 (the Feast of the Madonna), everything starts to fall apart. A nostalgic, humorous, sensual film that works on many different levels. In French, Arabic, and Italian with English subtitles.
Thursday, February 26, 1:30 p.m., and Saturday, February 28, 7:30 p.m., Terrell Hall, Room 122, PCC Cascade Campus.
Thursday Evening Documentary Series
In Honor of the Bicentennial of Haitian Independence
BITTER CANE (Haiti, 1983, 75 min.), directed by Jacques Arcelin, with HAITI: DREAMS OF DEMOCRACY (Haiti/UK, 1987, 52 min.), directed by Jonathan Demme.
Along with Man by the Shore, we are marking the bicentennial of Haiti’s status as an independent nation with two excellent documentaries. Bitter Cane starts with the first importation of African slaves to the nation, describes the movement that led to independence in 1804, then domination and eventually occupation by the U.S. for fifteen years in the early 1900s, and finally the brutal regime of the Duvaliers that was still intact when the documentary was made. The film sheds particular insight into the symbiotic relationship between the Duvaliers and American business interests. In English and Creole with English subtitles. In Haiti: Dreams of Democracy the Duvalier regime has been overthrown, the initial euphoria of liberation has passed, and the country is sinking beneath the weight of another kind of dictatorship; yet, the Haitian people continue to dream. Famed American director Jonathan Demme (Beloved, Silence of the Lambs, Philadelphia), a passionate supporter of Haitian arts and culture, joined with Transvision-Haiti to record this moment. This fascinating documentary turns the microphone over to musicians, traditional religious figures, activists, children, and homegrown music video artists. We see the energy that will soon bring Aristide to power and stay with him during his subsequent exile. In English and Creole with English subtitles.
Thursday, February 20, 7:30 p.m., Terrell Hall, Room 122, PCC Cascade Campus.
Women Filmmakers Week
MAMA AFRICA, GROWING UP URBAN, Part 2 ( Burkina Faso, Zimbabwe, and Tunisia, 2001, 78 min.), directed by Fanta Nacro, Ingrid Sinclair (director of Flame, shown at CFAF 8), and Raja Amari (director of Satin Rouge, shown at CFAF 13). “Under the surface of traditional forms, under the skin as it were, African women experience emotions, laugh and cry, love and hate, plan and plot, pursue and achieve excellence. But this is seldom shown, apart from in films directed by African women. By making these six films, we want to broaden the way in which Africans are perceived.”--Mama Africa. As part of last year’s Women Filmmakers Week, we showed three films from Mama Africa, a series of short films by young African women directors; this year we show three more. Bintou is from Burkina Faso, Riches from Zimbabwe, and One Evening in July from Tunisia. In English and various languages with English subtitles.
Thursday, March 4, 12:00 p.m., and Friday, March 5, 7:30 p.m., Terrell Hall, Room 122, PCC Cascade Campus.
Women Filmmakers Week
INCH’ALLAH DIMANCHE (2001, Algeria, 98 min.), directed by Yamina Benguigui. The setting is the 1970s, a time when very few African women accompanied their husbands when the men left home for menial work in France. Any Algerian woman doing so would be forced to live in virtual isolation. This is the case for Zouina, a young mother who must deal with a tyrannical mother-in-law, a weak husband who indulges his mother’s every whim, a xenophobic lunatic for a neighbor, and no one like her anywhere in sight—until she hears about another Algerian family in town, and begins a series of furtive adventures that produce unexpected results. Alternately heartrending and comic, this is Yamina Benguigui’s first feature film. In Arabic and French with English subtitles.
Thursday, February 27, 1:30 p.m., and Saturday, March 6, 7:30 p.m., Terrell Hall, Room 122, PCC Cascade Campus.
Women Filmmakers Week/Thursday Evening Documentary Series
THE SONG OF UMM DALAILA, THE STORY OF THE SAHRAWIS (Western Sahara/Algeria, 1993, 30 min.) and THE BEAT OF DISTANT HEARTS (Western Sahara/Algeria, 2003, 45 min.), directed by Danielle Smith. These two documentaries bring us into the lives of the Sahrawi people of West Sahara, displaced for nearly thirty years by their struggle for independence from Spain and the Moroccan invasion that followed. The Song of Umm Dalaila focuses on the role of women in the struggle; The Beat of Distant Hearts reveals the importance of the arts—both traditional and modernist—in giving form to the Sahrawi yearning for independence. Illuminating and filled with the unexpected. In English, Spanish, and Hassanya with English subtitles.
Thursday, February 27, 7:30 p.m., Terrell Hall, Room 122, PCC Cascade Campus.
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