Category: The Panorama section

Synopsis
An unprecedented alignment of planets impacting gravity will upset the balance of a ghetto and the destiny of two duos of brothers eager to do anything for their freedom in an unceasing fight between old and new generations

Biography

Franco-Burkinabè Cédric Ido is a screenwriter, director, actor and illustrator. He started his acting career
after a two-year course at the Film Conservatory at Suny Purchase in New York, starring in Manuel
Schapira’s short Les Meutes (2012) and in Spike Lee’s Miracle in Santa Anna (2008). He then goes to
directing with several shorts including Hasaki Ya Suda (2011) and Twaaga (2013), presented in many
festivals throughout the planet (including in Circuito Off Festival in Venice and in Seattle), and received
awards including at the African Movie Academy Awards in 2015, as well as it was selected for the Nuits en
Or – The Panorama by the Académie des Césars. Two years later, he directed his first feature-length effort
La Vie de Château in collaboration with Modi Barry, which also went to many international festivals and
notably the BFI London International Film Festival.

Synopsis
Xaraasi Xanne (Crossing Voices) recounts from a rare film, photographic and sound archive the
exemplary adventure of Somankidi Coura, an agricultural cooperative founded in Mali, in 1977, by
migrant workers from West Africa living in France in homes. The story of this improbable utopia of
returning to the country follows a tortuous path that sheds light, from the 1970s, on the ecological
stakes and struggles on the African continent today.

Biofilmography

Raphaël Grisey. born in 1979, lives in berlin. Grisey uses film, editorial and photographic works to address politics of memory, architecture, migration and agriculture (such as the films prvi deo, red star 2006 with f. lazar; cooperative, 2008; the exchange of perspectives ; minhocão, 2011; amor e progresso, 2014; remanescentes 2015).

Bouba Touré. (1948-2022), lived in Paris and Somankidi Coura, Mali. He lived in France in the foyer Pinel from 1965 and worked at the metal factory Chausson until 1969. He studied at the Vincennes university and was a projectionist at cinema 14 juillet and l’Entrepôt, Paris. Photographer since the 1970s, he documented the lives and struggles of migrant workers and peasants in france and mali. Touré co-founded the co-op of Somankidi Coura in 1977.

In 2015, he published the book “notre case est à saint denis, xérographes publishers.
Since the 1980s, Touré has exhibited works and given talks in associative and foyer’s circles and more recently in art institutions. His photographic work has been presented amongst other places at the Bamako Encounters 2019 and in the Hamburg Photography Triennale in 2022.

Since 2006, Touré and Grisey worked together on collaborative projects with the current name of sowing Somankidi Coura, a generative archive since 2015. it lead to various workshops, film and theatre production for example with the theatre group Kàddu Yaraax in 2017 and 2019, as well as publications and texts, such as Sowing Somankidi Coura, a generative archive (2017, archives book publishers) their works were shown amongst other venue at Kàddu Yaraax theatre forum festival, Kunsthall Trondheim (no), Archive Kabinett, Savvy Contemporary, HKW, Neue Berliner Kunstverein, Den Fries, 9^th Contour Biennale (be), Parco arte vivente, Un lieu pour respirer, Centre Pompidou, Dhaka art summit, Open justice and in Konsthall Göteborg. Their feature long film Xarassi Xanne-crossing voices has been awarded in 2022 at the festival Cinéma du Réel, African Film Festival of Tarifa (Spain), Monde en vues (Guadeloupe) & Archivio Aperto (Bologna – Italy).

Synopsis

In the streets of Cairo, documentary filmmaker Hala Galal moves purposefully and quickly.
She presents a brave face, but she is in constant fear of being harassed (or worse) just for
being a working single woman. Galal follows two women, Heba and Aya, who challenge the
norms and limitations of women in Egypt with a completely different fearlessness.
Heba tries to find space in her life as a single mother and photojournalist to create art that,
among other things, focuses on the existence of the female body. Although money is tight,
her small home is always filled with laughter and the smell of home-cooked food. Meanwhile,
Aya tries to find a foothold in her relationship with family, religion and passion for film. The
contact sport of roller derby takes up more and more of her time, and the community and
closeness to the other women on the team forces Aya to reconsider her position as a
woman.
All three women have a desire to create space for more voices and nuanced perspectives in
Egypt. They live alone and work in art specifically, through which they find their way, achieve
their dreams and find some happiness—regardless of the consequences.

Biofilmography

Hala Galal is a Filmmaker (writer, director and producer). She is the founder and executive
director of SEMAT Production & Distribution supporting Alternative/Independent Cinema in
Egypt. She has led SEMAT, a cultural hub with links to a number of civil society
organizations involved in the creative sector and youth as well as women organizations in
Egypt/the Arab Region. Hala produced more than 10 films for first time directors. Her long
documentary ‘Women ChitChat’ won the Silver Prize at the Arab Rotterdam Film Festival.

SYNOPSIS

After the death of his father, JEROME ADAMS flies back to his hometown Cape Town from Johannesburg, after a 10 year absence. Uninterested in being around his father’s club and minstrels, Jerome hopes to return to Johannesburg soon after the funeral. Given their toxic relationship, Jerome is surprised to discover that his father has left him THE GOEMA CLUB and The Umbrella Men minstrel troupe.

Biography

John Barker is a South African filmmaker based in Johannesburg. He is best known for his feature film
directorial debut BUNNY CHOW. The film was officially selected to screen at the TORONTO INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL, AFI Los Angeles, ROTTERDAM (TIGER AWARDS) LOCARNO
and RAINDANCE in 2006. The film received many international and local awards.
John is born to parents Clive Barker (national soccer coach) and Yvonne Barker. During the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa, John made a documentary SOUTH OF THE UMBILO about his childhood growing up in the southern suburbs of Durban, South Africa which produced many talented soccer players and coaches including his father Clive Barker.
John wrote, directed and produced South Africa’s first music mockumentary BLU CHEEZ, South Africa’s worst rock band. He gained recognition in SA for his controversial short film on the QUICKIES series.
He next directed the music documentary KWAITO GENERALS which focused on the KWAITO movement of the late nineties and early 2000s. He went on to direct 5 ON THE STREET music documentaries throughout Africa for Channel O.
During this time he joined THE PURE MONATE SHOW (Iconic sketch comedy show). He directed and wrote on season 1 and 2.
He then wrote, produced and directed BUNNY CHOW which employed a retro scripting technique with the actors improvising their dialogue to communicate the outlined script, written by Barker and David Kibuuka (currently writer/producer on the Daily Show) and retro scripted with Kagiso Lediga.
Feature films 31 MILLION REASONS and the acclaimed music documentary on the rock band CASSETTE followed.
John then joined SA’s most successful film franchise SPUD, directing SPUD 3 with John Cleese and Troye Sivan.
After this commercial venture he dived back into indie filmmaking, writing directing and producing WONDER BOY FOR PRESIDENT – a political satire on the ANC, starring many of the same actors/comedians from BUNNY CHOW.
Following the film John joined BOMB PRODUCTIONS as head director on ISIBAYA, ISITHEMBISO, AYEYA and the critically acclaimed period TV show THE ROAD (set in SOPHIA TOWN). He then directed BET’s first daily drama ISONO.
John has recently completed his 15 year journey film THE UMBRELLA MEN which he co wrote, directed and produced with Joel Phiri from KAE. LOLLY, the Lolly Jackson gangster film with Sharlto Copley and THE UMBRELLA II are in pre production. An 8 part documentary series BAFANA THE BOYS
about soccer in SA, is in pre prod.

Synopsis

On 9 April 1989, after another clash between Mauritanian herders and Senegalese farmers on the Senegalese border at Diawara, there was an incredible escalation of violence in both countries.

These events resulted in thousands of victims and tens of thousands of refugees.

Thirty years after the conflict, the wounds have not yet healed.

In Dagana, Senegal, on the border of the two countries, I bring together forty protagonists, witnesses and victims, under the palaver tree, to look back on these events on both sides of the river, in order to understand what really happened, and to try to take a step towards reconciliation together.

Biography

Alassane Diago was born in 1985 in Agnam Lidoubé, Senegal. After completing an audiovisual training course in Dakar in 2007, he took several courses in directing techniques and scriptwriting, notably with the documentary filmmaker Samba Félix Ndiaye. He worked on various film sets, including Lili-et-le baobab directed by Chantal Richard, before directing his first feature-length documentary, Les Larmes de l’émigration (2010), which won several awards. Alassane Diago now lives in Paris.

SYNOPSIS

Angola. Three generations of women in a 25-year-long civil war: Lelena (the grandmother), Nayola (the daughter) and Yara (the granddaughter). 

 Past and present interlace. Nayola goes in search of her missing husband at the height of the war. Decades later, the country is finally at peace but Nayola has not returned. Yara has become a rebellious teenager and a subversive rap singer. Lelena tries to contain her for fear of the police coming to arrest her. One night, a masked intruder breaks into their house, armed with a machete. An encounter like nothing they could have imagined. 

  Biofilmography

José Miguel Ribeiro was born in 1966 in Amadora, Portugal. He graduated in Visual Arts at Fine Art School in Lisbon and studied drawing and puppets animation in Lazzenec-Bretagne – Rennes and in Filmógrafo – Oporto in 1993/4. During several years he taught puppets animation in Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation in Lisbon. He was animator of Os Salteadores directed by Abi Feijó among other films. He co-directed O Ovo, which won several international awards and other short animations for Portuguese version of Sesam’s Street. In 1996 and for the first time, he won an award in Cinanima with O Banquete da Rainha. He directed A Suspeita, which won the Cartoon D’Or 2000 and more than 25 international awards. In 2004, he made a cartoon series Home Things that consists of 26 episodes, where the protagonists are the things that are in a house: the mop, the toothbrush, the glasses, the vacuum cleaner etc. The series was honored with several international awards.

NAYOLA is his debut feature.