NY African Film Festival — May 9 Lineup

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NY African Film Festival 23

http://www.africanfilmny.org/category/festival/

Monday, May 9

Akounak Tedalat Taha Tazoughai, Christopher Kirkley, Niger, 2015, 75mins

Akounak Tedalat Taha Tazoughai
(Rain the Color of Blue with a Little Red In It)
Monday, May 9th at 2:00pm
Francesca Beale Theater • Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center • 144 West 65th Street

An homage to the Western rock-drama and the 1984 film Purple Rain, Akounak is the first narrative feature in the Tuareg language. The film depicts the universal story of one musician’s struggle to make it against all odds, set in the winner-takes-all Tuareg guitar scene in Agadez, Niger.
Introduction by film star Mdou Moctar and Director Christopher Kirkley

Tanna, Bentley Dean and Martin Butler, Australia/Vanuatu, 2015, 104mins

http://www.africanfilmny.org/category/festival/

Tanna
Monday, May 9th at 3:45pm
Francesca Beale Theater • Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center • 144 West 65th Street

Based on a true story and featuring members of the Yakel tribe in Vanuatu, Tanna tells the story
of a young girl from one of the world’s last tribal societies who breaks off an arranged marriage to run
away with her lover, setting off a war that threatens the future of their people.

Black Jews: The Roots of the Olive Tree, Laurence Gavron, Senegal/France, 2016, 56mins

Black Jews: The Roots of the Olive Tree
Monday, May 9th at 6:00pm
Francesca Beale Theater • Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center • 144 West 65th Street

Over the course of the 20th century, a large number of groups in Sub-Saharan Africa spontaneously converted to Judaism and claimed Jewish identity. These communities respect the worship rituals and dietary restrictions of Judaism, which they often learn from the Internet, as well as through Jewish culture (including cuisines, music, and language). Laurence Gavron’s film gives an account of this black Judaism through an African community— that of Cameroon, with Serge Etélé as its spiritual leader. Featuring an interview with Rabbi Capers Funnye, Michelle Obama’s cousin and leader of the black Jewish community in the United States. (Screening with The Dance of King David)
Q&A with Director Laurence Gavron will follow the screening

The Dance of King David, Axel Baumann, USA, 2011, 32mins

The Dance of King David
Monday, May 9th at 6:00pm
Francesca Beale Theater • Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center • 144 West 65th Street

In this documentary about the history and contemporary worship of the Ark of the Covenant, Axel Baumann examines the disappearance of the Ark from Israel and its reemergence in Ethiopia, and witnesses the “Dance of King David”—an ancient rite still performed by Jews and Ethiopians alike. (Screening with Black Jews)

La Belle at the Movies, Cecilia Zoppelletto, UK/Belgium/Congo, 2015, 67mins

La Belle at the Movies
Monday, May 9th at 8:30pm
Francesca Beale Theater • Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center • 144 West 65th Street

Kinshasa, “Kin la Belle” is a city of 10 million people without a single cinema. The story of the city, its apartheid era, and Mobutu’s neocolonialism, unfolds through the fate of its cinemas. At the same time, “La Belle” celebrates the Kinshasa cowboys who found their identity in the Spaghetti Westerns of the 1960s. Through interviews and poetic imagery, La Belle at the Movies bears a unique testimony to an African film industry in crisis – orphaned but living in hope for a brighter future. (Screening with Twaaga)
Q&A with Cecilia Zoppelletto will follow the screening

Twaaga, Cedric Ido, France/Burkina Faso, 2013, 30mins

Twaaga (Invincible)
May 9th at 8:30pm
Francesca Beale Theater • Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center • 144 West 65th Street

Burkina Faso in 1985 is a country in the throes of revolution. Manu, a young boy who loves comics, tags
along with his big brother Albert. When Albert decides to undergo a magic ritual, Manu realizes there are real powers to rival even those of superheroes. (Screening with La Belle at the Movies)

Tuesday, May 10

The Cursed Ones, Nana Obiri Yeboah and Maximillian Claussen, Ghana/UK, 2015, 95mins

The Cursed Ones
Tuesday, May 10th at 1:30pm
Francesca Beale Theater • Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center • 144 West 65th Street

A series of misfortunes lead a West African village to accuse a young girl, Asabi of witchcraft. Their Pastor insists that salvation lies in her exorcism and death, using his compelling rhetoric to incite fear into the people and turn Asabi’s mother (Ama K Abebrese) against her own daughter. Disillusioned reporter, Godwin finds himself swept up in the witch hunt. With the help of a young school teacher, he attempts to save Asabi’s life, fighting back against corruption and false prophets. Based on true events, The Cursed Ones is a story of morality, corruption, and community in the heart of Africa.

Cuckold, Charlie Vundla, South Africa, 2015, 95mins

Cuckold
Tuesday, May 10th at 3:45pm
Francesca Beale Theater • Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center • 144 West 65th Street

The second feature by Charlie Vundla (director of How to Steal 2 Million, a selection of the 2012 New York African Film Festival), Cuckold tells the story of a young African-American professor in Johannesburg (played by Vundla) who falls apart after his wife leaves him for another man. While trying to drink himself into oblivion, he has a chance encounter with an old schoolmate who is now a homeless life coach. Together (with a little help from the drug trade), the two men prop each other up, and things soon ease back into normalcy… until the professor’s wife reappears sobbing at his doorstep. An unusual ménage à trois arrangement follows, one that seems destined to wreak havoc on the fragile state of affairs.

Negritude: A Dialogue Between Wole Soyinka and Senghor, Manthia Diawara USA/France/Germany/Portugal, 2015, 59mins

Negritude: A Dialogue Between Wole Soyinka and Senghor
Tuesday, May 10th at 6:00pm
Francesca Beale Theater • Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center • 144 West 65th Street

This imagined dialogue between Léopold Sédar Senghor, one of the founding fathers of Negritude, and Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka was reconstructed almost entirely from archival materials. It probes the relevance of the concept of Negritude against the views of its many critics, not only to the decolonization and independence movements of the 1950s and 1960s but also to an understanding of the contemporary artistic and political scenes of nationalism, religious intolerance, multiculturalism, the exodus of Africans and other populations from the South, and xenophobic immigration policies in the West.
Q&A with Historian and Director of Columbia University’s Institute for African Studies Mamadou Diouf will follow the screening

Shorts Program #2 – Africa in New York
Tuesday, May 10th at 7:45pm
Francesca Beale Theater • Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center • 144 West 65th Street
(Program total: 58mins)
Q&A with Iquo B. Essien, MaameYaa Boafo, Alfonso Johnson, Mamadou Dia, Hoji Fortuna
will follow the screening

Afripedia x New York, Teddy Goitom, Benjamin Taft, & Senay Berhe, Sweden/USA, 2016, 12mins

Afripedia x New York
In the first in a series of short films set in the African diaspora, we meet Ethiopian/Eritrean Missla Libsekal, the founder of online publication Another Africa, as she embraces collaboration to counter the assumed perspectives of Africa and Africans. Senegalese/French photographer Delphine Diallo shares her passion and challenges in mindfully shifting her lens between Dakar and New York, while Somalian/Australian world champion Hula Hoop master Marawa continues to perfect her passion in the face of conventional expectations. Welcome to Afripedia, welcome to creativity.

Anton, Ntare Guma Mbaho Mwine, USA/Uganda/Germany, 2016, 5mins (Program total: 58mins)

Anton
A young German boy longs for his father in Africa.

Contained, Mamadou Dia, Senegal/USA, 2016, 8mins (Program total: 58mins)

Contained
A man quarantined for being suspected of having Ebola begins to question his health as well as his psychological state.

Olive, Alfonso Johnson, USA, 2016, 7mins

Olive
Olive is a short film that explores betrayal, heartbreak, and chance encounters. The film was inspired by
the song O Mistress Mine written by William Shakespeare and performed by Caleb Eberhardt of the
hip-hop/jazz duo Quincy Vidal.

Reluctantly Queer, Akosua Adoma Owusu, Ghana/USA, 2016, 8mins

Reluctantly Queer
This epistolary short film invites us into the unsettling life of a young Ghanaian man struggling to reconcile his love for his mother with his desires amid the increased tensions incited by queer politics in Ghana. A New Directors/New Films 2016 selection.

New York, I Love You, Iquo b. Essien, USA, 2016, 21mins

New York, I Love You
Viviane is a neurotic, struggling actress given to childish flights of fancy—like moving to Los Angeles on a whim. But can she really leave New York and Kazembe, the love of her life, behind?

UP NEXT!
23rd NYAFF at Maysles Cinema
Don’t miss our great line-up of documentary films at Maysles Cinema
May 13 -15!

May 1 – May 30, 2016

TICKETS NOW ON SALE

General Admission tickets for 2016 NYAFF screenings are now on sale!
Click the venue links below to purchase tickets.

Film Society of Lincoln Center May 4 – 10
Maysles Cinema May 13 – 15
Brooklyn Academy of Music’s BAMcinematek May 26 – 30

For twenty-six years, African Film Festival, Inc. (AFF) has bridged the divide between post-colonial Africa and the American public through the medium of film. AFF’s unique place in the international arts community is distinguished not only by leadership in festival management but by a comprehensive approach to the advocacy of African film and culture. AFF established the New York African Film Festival (NYAFF) in 1993 with Film Society of Lincoln Center. The New York African Film Festival is presented annually by African Film Festival, Inc. and Film Society of Lincoln Center, in association with Brooklyn Academy of Music. AFF also produces a series of local, national, and international programs throughout the year.

http://www.africanfilmny.org/category/festival/

African Film Festival, Inc. (AFF) is a non-profit 501(c)(3) arts organization.

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