Category Archives: Cinema
“Are you not entertained?”
A pocketsize note on Gladiator II
As per usual, Denzel Washington underlined that he masters his craft in the most sublime ways. That, the grandeur-boostin’ special effects and the shot of that one warrior entering the arena on a massive rhino made for an enjoyable Friday morning at the cinema.
However, I’d love to see what directors and screenwriters like Ramata-Toulaye Sy and Nia DaCosta would do with a Gladiator-budget. I trust that if people/populations were to be invented, Sy and DaCosta’s imaginations would give us the best costumes, make-up, conversations, confrontations and perhaps even languages. They wouldn’t present us characters, extra’s and sceneries looking like the product of someone whose whole sense of creativity is rooted in one Heart of Darkness-esque book about Moors, Kel Tamasheq and ‘Thee Arabs’.
And with all those myths that have survived even the most ancient of times… from women with snakes for hair and just all kinds of ruthless killers… why are all the women so soft and helpless? Why are we only crying and dying all the time? Give us a Lashana Lynch or Jean Grae looking person who, in reaction to the evil she witnesses, kills for sport. Give us a head of empire whose army of elephant riding, Hannibal-coded soldiers comes in, pulls out some gladiators’ spines, eats too many grapes at the afterparty and leaves the next morning. Probably with a few captives but with not too much drama. Elegantly. And who knows, maybe they’ll come back. Maybe not all of them return to where they came from and those who don’t, install this lingering fear that one day there will be a rebellion. But, not right now because now, they just came for the sport. To witness and to participate, to win. Just to keep them Romans and Greeks on their sandaled toes. Can we please have some fear-spreading women? Who aren’t randomly evil but still terrifying? Women whose terror isn’t the result of trauma or a broken heart but who still, out of a survivalist habit, actively choose violence every day and from the moment they wake up.
Can we have main characters who are women
who fight
over something other than a man
and who don’t die
but who live
for something other than a man?
Banel & Adama, HipHopHuis, Gember & Rooibos
Banel & Adama
“A new generation of film makers, strong-willed and with a superb mastery of technics is born. A relief troop.”
– Sembène Ousmane in ‘Cinema as evening school’, his preface in L’Afrique et le Centenaire du Cinema/Africa and the Centenary of Cinema.
Banel & Adama is a stereotype-free, stroll-paced unfolding of a love story disrupted by expectations. Its scenery centres around the steadiness of traditions and the rush of tragedies accelerated by capitalism. Or, more specifically: gender norms and the climate crisis. As an heir to Djibril Diop Mambèty’s infamous remixing of cinema’s grammar, director Ramata-Toulaye Sy masterfully takes us from a honey-sweet lovin’ to a magic-realist sobering.
Khady Mane, who plays Banel, is captivating in her portrayal of a new bride who’s trying her best to preserve a dream that’s close to being reality-checked to a halt. Mamadou Diallo is ever so gracious in his portrayal of Adama, a young husband figuring out how to not just carry but properly balance the inherited into its future.
Since attending its première at this year’s edition of International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR), Ramata-Toulaye Sy’s masterpiece has been on my mind. With its gorgeous cinematography plus its perfectly scored moments of quiet and consideration, Banel & Adama gives us the Tonimorrison-esque narration that matches our imagination. Truly, a relief.
HipHopHuis + Gember &… Rooibos – episode 1 of 7.
On Saturday March 9 (15.00h-17.00h), Adrian Van Wyk and I will join the Rotterdam fam for a conversation about the short documentary What the Soil Remembers. We’ll do so as part of the first HipHopHuis-based edition of the GembertheeSessies (Ginger tea sessions), co-hosted by HipHopHuis and Bijlmer Parktheater. HipHopHuis has been a home for a good 20 years. Their interest in co-hosting a GembertheeSessies is an absolute honour. Tickets for this gathering can be bought via this link.
After this event, Van Wyk and I will move our conversation back to my sofa and dinner table. From there, we’ll edit chunks of it into episode one of a 7-part podcast series: Gember &… . Episode 1 -Gember & Rooibos- will centre around the following:
– The Kitchen (film)
– Banel & Adama (film)
– The Mother of All Lies (film)
– Rye Lane (film)
– Cécile McLorin Salvant’s concert in Brussel
– The concert of the Asher Gamedze Quartet in Rotterdam
IFFR
Being part of the IFFR press crew this year was great. I was honoured and overjoyed to be part of a festival that’s so dear to me. Special mention to Lyse Ishimwe. (blows dancehall airhorn)
Picture 1: Still from Banel & Adama.
Picture 2: Still from the videoclip for Asher Gamedze‘s Wynter Time
International Film Festival Rotterdam – tips
In the Netherlands there are two festivals that, for at least the last nine years, make me mark my calendar for the full duration of their activities. One of them is International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR). This year, the festival takes place from January 25-February 4. Their program is always packed-packed and I know that for some of us it’s a bit overwhelming to go through the entire festival schedule. Personally, I love it and, I’m happy to share my list:
Films
– Mário, directed by Billy Woodberry. This doc is described as: “biography of Angolan-born Mário Pinto de Andrade (1928-1990, seen on picture below), a key figure in African revolutionary and anti-colonial struggles.”
– The Ballad of Suzanne Césaire
– Madame Luna
– Remembering the riots in Afrikaanderwijk in 1972
– Nombre de guerra: Miguel Enríquez
– Tierra en trance
Each film has various dates and times on which they’re shown.
Talks
– Friday Jan. 26 – RTM Talks: Reclaiming Narrative
– Saturday January 27: Talk with Billy Woodberry (director of Mário).
laZeefuik 
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