Celebrating 20 Years of the New African Film Festival
The New African Film Festival, a pan-African film festival that takes place in Washington, D.C., boasts 26 films from over a dozen countries this year.
Presented by the American Film Institute (AFI) and Africa World Project, the New African Film Festival (NAFF) is celebrating its 20th anniversary this year. The festival consistently screens a wide range of films from across Africa and its diaspora, offering a showcase of the diversity and excellence of African cinema.
Returning to Washington, D.C., this year’s festival will span two weeks, from Friday, March 15 to Thursday, March 29. It will screen 26 films from over a dozen countries, a selection spanning box office hits from across Africa, Oscar selections and U.S. Premieres for some films already on the festival circuit. There’s The Bride by Rwandan filmmaker Myriam Birara, an engaging tale about stolen youth and dreams; Quartier Lointains: Métamorphose(s), a compilation of short films rooted in pan-African emigration; The Last Queen, a historical epic inspired by the legendary Queen of Algiers, Zaphira, and many more. As with previous years, festival goers at NAFF will definitely be spoilt for choices.
Going into Friday, OkayAfrica presents a round-up of ten films to look forward to at this year’s edition.
'A TRIBE CALLED JUDAH'
Funke Akindele is Nollywood’s Queen of Blockbusters. A Tribe Called Judah, the first film to gross over a billion naira at the box office in Nigeria, is possibly her greatest achievement to date, and not just for its record-setting commercial milestone. Directed by Akindele herself, the film is an action-comedy that weaves the complexity of familial bonds into the madness of a robbery gone wrong. It’s a wonderful balancing act between intensity and levity, where heist theatrics and distinct Nigerian comedy exist in great harmony.
'MAPANTSULA'
“The legacy of apartheid hasn’t healed and young people are experiencing the trauma indirectly through what their parents went through, so they get it,” South African director Oliver Schmitz told OkayAfrica last year while discussing the 4K restoration of the 1988 anti-apartheid classic, Mapantsula. After screening at the Cannes Film Festival and last year’s Berlinale, more people can watch the gangster thriller Trojan Horse, an incisive look at the times told in vivid colors.
'MONEY, FREEDOM, A STORY OF THE CFA FRANC'
To date, several Central and West African countries still have the CFA franc as their local currency, one that has been criticized for undercutting the sovereignty of these former French colonies. In her documentary feature, director Katy Lena Ndiaye traces the history of the CFA franc, providing an encompassing context for the controversial currency that is pegged to the French franc, digging into its creation in the past and what it means for the monetary policies of several countries in the present.
'THE CEMETERY OF CINEMA'
In The Cemetery of Cinema, Thierno Souleymane Diallo journeys towards the past, searching for what is believed to be the first film ever made in Guinea — Mouramani. Directed by Mamdou Touré, Mouramani is symbolic of a country inching towards independence, and being unable to easily trace it sends Diallo through Guinea and France. The documentary, which takes viewers through Diallo’s mission-based and barefooted movement, is a striking act of drumming up awareness for a long-forgotten past, presenting a history of Guinean and African cinema in the process.
'ALL THE COLOURS OF THE WORLD ARE BETWEEN BLACK AND WHITE'
In Nigeria’s conservative and puritanical society, queer people are not to be seen or heard from — at least, not in a positive or remotely flattering light. Babatunde Apalowo’s All the Colours of the World Are Between Black and Whitedoesn’t just reject that construct, it unreservedly presents the complexities of being queer as a matter of humanity. Of course, it takes into account the social context of being pushed outside the margins, but its central characters are people with tangible, worthy emotions.
'BANEL & ADAMA'
No matter how much two people love each other, their internal bliss will always interact with the world outside. The titular characters of Banel & Adama seem to have their own version of utopia figured out in their remote village in Northern Senegal, but their promise of paradise is interrupted by Adama’s call to duty. In her folksy epic, Senegalese French director Ramata-Toulaye Sy delivers a searing film, where natural beauty and elements of magical realism are employed in service of a story where utopia has to contend with the complicatedness of reality.
'DEATH OF A WHISTLEBLOWER'
Over three decades before he finally started making Death of a Whistleblower, South African filmmaker Ian Gabriel had the idea stashed in his creative vault. Despite not being able to make the film earlier due to apartheid-related boycotts, Gabriel remained true to the truth-seeking core of his original idea while modernizing its setting. In it, Noxolo Dlamini plays Luyanda Masinda, an investigative journalist who unearths state secrets and a grand conspiracy while digging into the murder of her colleague. Gabriel’s film might be fiction, but several nods to the past and present of South African politics give the high-wire action a beating pulse.
'GOODBYE JULIA'
Last year, Sudanese filmmaker Mohamed Kordofani made double history at the Cannes Film Festival. Not only was Goodbye Julia - his debut feature film — the first from Sudan to play at the festival, it also won the inaugural Freedom Prize. At the New African Film Festival, more people will be able to watch a story of humanity in Sudan, a country currently facing an alarming hunger crisis due to an ongoing war. Set in the years before the 2011 referendum that led to the secession of South Sudan, Goodbye Julia is a fictional story of two characters linked by a murder, with stakes heightened by the real-life backdrop of political and ethno-religious tension.
'OMEN'
“I’m obsessed with symbolism in art,” Belgian Congolese rapper-turned-filmmaker Baloji told OkayAfrica last year. That much is evident in his debut feature film, Omen (Augure), a magical realism enveloper based on the director’s own diasporic experience. Premiering at last year’s Cannes Film Festival to rave reviews, it follows 30-something-year-old Koffi (Marc Zinga) as he returns home to his estranged family in Congo, while seeking their blessing to marry his pregnant fiancée Alice (Lucy Debay). Baloji plunges his characters into the world of witchcraft and sorcery to make his debut a twisty thriller.
'FOUR DAUGHTERS'
Nominated for Best Documentary Feature at this year’s Oscars, Kaouthar Ben Hania’s Four Daughters is, in recent times, one of the most remarkable feats of creativity in African cinema. The docu-fiction film is a familial tale that pulls from real-life inspiration, intimately portraying the lives of a middle-aged Tunisian woman and two of her daughters who voluntarily move to the far right, Islamic State of Libya. Featuring both testimonies from those who lived the life and terrific acting performances, Four Daughters breaks the fourth wall from the jump, inventively merging documentary and fiction elements in service of a captivating story.
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