Movie reviews

AFRYKAMERA 2019

ONI NIE ZNAJA NASZEJ SZTUKI (THEY DO NOT KNOW OUR ART)

Watchable. Feels empty and superficial. More of a social documentary than one on art. Rarely do you get to see the discussed artworks on the full big screen. The focus is on artists, their graffiti is only in the backdrop. Paulina Zając's debut is technically imperfect too.

I learnt more from the Q&A after the screening than from the film itself: The film was hard to shoot. Due to the threat of terrorism no filming was allowed but on Sunday municipal guards were off meaning no one would forbid cameras. It took four years to make, months of editing. The term Nairobbery is still there but the artists from the documentary were mugged because of their art. They also received death threats when they ran their anti-political campaign. The graffiti campaign was grassroots anti-political activism which was illegal. Normally the artists make money, paid by wall owners, and travel the world of art galleries. Their works are often used in music videos or Pepsi adverts which is missing in the documentary. One of the graffiti painters calls himself Bankslave. The director mentioned also tourists shooting slums who gave no money for the locals and dubbed it "photo-neocolonialism".

I left the African film festival to see the sequel to a Bollywood movie:

MARDAANI 2

Watchable. Very American in style: only 1 hour 45 minutes long, gruesome murders, an autopsy (at least in India an autopsy of a woman is performed by a female), a serial killer playing games with the police. And no singing and dancing but it's a crime story so that would be weird even in Bollywood. The beginning is brilliant: a young man is bragging about how smart he is with women. You'd think he's a dating scene superstar. The actor - Vishal Jethwa, normally know from TV serials, one scene mentions Hanuman which may be a reference to the show - is magnificent, perfectly cast in a role requiring impersonating varying individuals. The way he looks at the camera that is at the viewers lingers in your mind long after leaving the cinema. The movie's loaded with women rights awareness. Whatever SP (Rani Mukherjee in the leading role again) lists as a woman's experience is so true, also in Europe. With the difference that, apparently, in India some seats on buses are reserved for women so that if you menstruate you don't have to stand - I wish we'd have the same regulation here. The feminist fragments are smartly presented, to the point, they form some of better parts of the movie. Unfortunately the script is more Hollywood than Bollywood. However Hindi language is a bit of hindrance here - some dialogues are so fast it's impossible to read the subtitles quickly enough.


AFRYKAMERA 2019

MINGA EL LA CUILLERE CASSEE (MINGA AND THE BROKEN SPOON)

Watchable. It's almost a cartoon musical. The songs are in French. The animation style is a bit old-fashioned. But the story's quite African, especially the ghost and the trickster tropes. While I'd prefer it without the music, it's engaging and well worth seeing for a change from Western fairy tales.

8

Watchable. It drags. A pretty standard horror with minor African elements. Spooks in scene one. One jump scare and a few more spooks later.

YOU WILL DIE AT 20

Walked out. The film drags and the main actor's ugly so nothing kept me there.

AFROSHORTS: SPIRITUALITY

INTERVENCAO JAH (JAH INTERVENTION)

Walked out. Weird dance. Poor quality picture and sound, with some annoying clinking noise.

Yellow is used in the short doc because chromatically it's the colour you recognize first so it's used for intervention. "Jah" means "god" or "now". The mask is cannibalistic and the performer's tribe's symbol is an aligator. The performance is aimed against the military command of the police because that equals using brutal force in favelas. The previous government enabled blacks studying, moving up the social ladder. Now the new government is taking it back. Killings at the guise of fighting drugs serve to erase the rising people. Those people also have less access to the media so their voice is hardly heard.

DOUBOUT (STAND UP)

Watchable. Fun, family picture. A mixture of international (the boy uses a light sabre) and African (the rite of passage) cultures. The subplot with the monster finds no conclusion but it's entertaining anyway.

RAZANA

Watchable. Ambiguous but ends well. The roar of a taking off plane over the end credits is an interesting sound effect.

THE WOMAN IN THE PHOTO

Watchable. Well-made but the final scene is inexplicable.

BAXU AND THE GIANTS

Recommended. An uplifting tale about resilience to your toxic family and about inner strength to change your community. And about how wildlife crime goes against one's own roots.