Film
Borom Sarret
| Writer/Director | Ousmane Sembène |
| Genre | Drama |
| Country | Senegal |
| Languages | French with English Subtitles |
| Duration | 19 minutes |
| Year | 1963 |
Ousmane Sembène's ‘Borom Sarret’ which debuted in 1963, was not only the director’s first film, but the first African feature film. Sembène’s official biographer, Samba Gadjigo, describes the film as a “spare masterpiece of protest against economic exploitation. This black and white short is about the day in the life of a poor cart driver trying to eke out a living transporting passengers around Dakar. Borom Sarret won first prize for Best Film at the Tours Festival (France) that year.
FAAT-KINÉ
| Writer/Director | Ousmane Sembène |
| Genre | Drama, Comedy |
| Country | Senegal |
| Languages | French and Wolof with English Subtitles |
| Duration | 121 minutes |
| Year | 2000 |
“A portrait of a woman whose strength, fortitude, and sense of humor put the heroines of most American films to shame... a witty, sophisticated comedy of manners, African style.” – Frank Scheck, Hollywood Reporter
Sembène looks at the relationship of gender, economics and power in the story of Faat-Kiné, who triumphs as a successful businesswoman and single mother in spite of being deceived and betrayed by three important men in her life: her father who shunned her, her teacher who seduced her and abandoner her and your daughter; and a local shyster, who swindles her out of her life savings.
Moolaadé
| Writer/Director | Ousmane Sembène |
| Genre | Drama |
| Country | Burkino Faso |
| Languages | Jula (a dialect of Bambara) and French with English Subtitles |
| Duration | 124 minutes |
| Year | 2004 |
“One of the most ardently feminist films of recent years.” – Time Out New York
The Film Forum’s aptly sets the stage for the film: “In a remote Burkina Faso village, the impending mass ceremony of female circumcision goes wrong as this year’s class of young girls jump down wells or head for the home of Collé, herself a holdout against tradition, and her red thread of sanctuary, the Moolaadé.”
Moolaadé was Sembène’s final film - part two of an unfinished trilogy that began with his 2000 film, Faat-Kiné. It is at once a passionately critical look at an African practice of female genital mutilation that is practiced in more than 38 countries and a tribute to everyday heroism of African women (and men) against the tremendous internal problems facing modern day, post-colonial Africa.
Moolaadé was the winner of the Cannes Film Festival ("Un Certain Regard") in 2004 and was voted Best Foreign Film of the Year by the National Society of Film Critics. Moolaadé was selected as One of the Ten Best Films of the Year by New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Chicago Sun-Times, USA Today, Entertainment Weekly, Philadelphia Inquirer, Washington Post, Boston Globe, LA Weekly, Dallas Morning News, Chicago Tribune, The Village Voice, Houston Chronicle.
