African Cinema Conference presents...
REVIEW: movie--the silence of the forest
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http://www.screendaily.com/story.asp?storyid=13179
The Silence Of The Forest (Le Silence De La Foret)
Lee Marshall in Cannes 14 July 2003
Didier Ouenangare and Bassek Ba Kobhio’s slight tale has been billed as
the first ever Central African film, says Lee Marshall
Dirs: Didier Ouenangare, Bassek Ba Kobhio. Central African
Republic-Cameroon-Gabon. 2003. 91mins
More a consciousness-raising gesture than a piece of cinema, pure and
simple, The Silence Of The Forest is a slight, innocent tale of a
French-educated African intellectual’s misguided attempt to combat his
country’s black-on-black racism and help an oppressed pygmy tribe.
Still, the film, which premiered in Directors’ Fortnight at Cannes, is
an admirable result for what is being billed as the first ever Central
African film. So few full-length features are greenlit in sub-Saharan
Africa that co-director Ouenangare had to wait until he was 50 to make
his debut. The film’s prospects of overseas distribution will probably
be limited to France, but it should tour Francophone Africa inside and
outside of the standard exhibition channels, especially if its obvious
didactic intent is translated into showings for schools and villages.
Big box-office results at home are sadly unlikely: the single cinema in
the Central African Republic has, apparently, closed down.
The film tells the story of Gonaba, an intellectual who returns to his
homeland with the dream of improving living conditions and educational
standards. After 10 years he has risen to become Inspector of Schools,
but is disillusioned, and has returned to see the truth of the words
spoken by a cynical boatman on his return: "In this country, all we
have is manioc for breakfast, manioc for lunch, manioc for dinner and a
new set of ministers every month."
Invited to an official reception for party cadres, Gonaba takes the
side of the pygmies who have been hired to dance for the ‘big men’ as
if they were circus entertainers. Though a romance with a beautiful bar
owner provides some distraction, Gonaba decides that his destiny lies
with the pygmies in the forest: he has ambitious plans to better their
lot and encourage them to rebel against their oppressors.
But in the end, when he finally does make it to a pygmy village, it is
Gonaba who is educated - in the lore, traditions and hunting skills of
his hosts. Gonaba’s jungle debriefing is managed as efficiently as one
might expect; in fact, his gradual, grudging acceptance into the tribe
is the stuff of any number of Hollywood Shangri-la scripts.
Pierre-Olivier Larrieu’s camerawork makes the most of the lush jungle
greens, red earth hues and firelight on black faces, and Manu Dibango’s
Afrobeat soundtrack is mixed with tribal music (including an a cappella
funeral chant that sounds like it might have been composed by Philip
Glass), and an urban band sequence that keeps toes tapping.
The most interesting thing about the film, though – apart from its
ethnological value as a rare glimpse of the life and customs of the
Koungou pygmies – remains Gonaba’s misguided attempt to apply Western
canons of liberty, equality and fraternity to a jungle community. He is
desperate to be blacker than his ‘white man’ colleagues in government,
but in the end, it is Gonaba’s girlfriend who sums up his doomed
mission when she tells him, admiringly, "You’re a black man but you
behave like a white man - you’re my ideal".
Prod co: Les Films Terre Africaine
Co-prod: Ecrans Noirs, Centre National du Cinema
Int’l sales: Mercure International
Prods: Abderrahmane Sissako, Guillaume de Seille
Scr: Didier Ouenangare, Bassek ba Kobhio, Marcel Beaulieu, from the
novel by Etienne Goyemide
Cinematography: Pierre-Olivier Larrieu
Ed: Joseph Licide
Prod des: Heather Cameron
Music: Manu Dibango
Main cast: Eriq Ebouaney, Sonia Zembourou, Nadege Beausson-Diagne,
Philippe Maury >>
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