Film Festival Coverage Hub - Reviews & Recaps

Ekoua – Pan African Film Festival (PAFF) 2020

Ekoua is an ambitious animated dystopian film from Cote d’Ivoire featuring a Hero’s Journey story which unfortunately loses itself in exposition.

Visually, the 3D animation looks like it’s still in the development stage. Many animated objects are incomplete or forgotten about, such as a waiter carrying a tray with her arms by her side. More objects unnaturally cross spatial boundaries, such as a the baby’s legs blending into the crib it’s lying in when they move.

There’s also an unnecessary amount of shots in which characters are traveling from A to B either by walking or in cars. These shots are usually lengthened either side of the shot to show characters frozen still before and after they’ve started traveling. It adds time to a film which doesn’t need it. It reminded me of watching someone play a long game of Sims.

You could fault the criticisms above on a lack of funding or animated capabilities. Animated African films are rare compared to the number of animated films produced in North America and Asia. Ekoua is an ambitious attempt at creating a new dystopian world through animation. However, even with the limited animation capabilities, a complex storyline makes Ekoua hard to love.

At the start of the film, Ekoua sets itself up as a potential satire by introducing a dystopian world ruled by scammers. However, the scammer dystopia set up in the opening is never explained. The only scammers we see are two brightly dressed men that make it rain in clubs, and suspiciously keep following Ekoua for no apparent reason. Instead of exploring the scammer dystopia, Ekoua alters direction to follow a narrative of Ekoua becoming a ‘seer’ and eliminating an evil baby.

From there the film felt like a slow crazy dream. Here’s an outline of a portion of the plot I understood:

Ekoua becomes a seer thanks to an elder.
She has a vision that informs her that her neighbors newborn baby is an evil spirit reincarnated and that she must eliminate it to avoid repeating the same mistakes her mum made.
Scammers chase Ekoua and beat her up.
Ekoua takes the evil baby.
Royal police show up and guide Ekoua to the capital with the evil baby.
A band of mutated hyenas led by a mutant elephant named Koffi stop them and steal the baby.
Ekoua tracks the band of mutants to their hideout and recovers the baby.
Ekoua and the royal policeman move on to the capital.

Then the plot gets confusing.

Overall, Ekoua could do with a bit more simplicity. The story has a lot of different strands (scammer world, Ekoua’s mum, visions, hero’s journey) that make it hard to follow. With a more focused script and more budget to improve the animation, Ekoua would instantly improve.

The Intruder – AFI Fest 2020

The Intruder does a lot in the opening 15 minutes. It develops the character of Ines rapidly to set the tone for the rest of the movie. We see that she works as a voice actor helping to dub foreign movies and is a part time chorister. We also find out that she has a lot of nightmares and is terrified of a lot of things such as planes and bats. There’s also her annoying boyfriend who helps to define her as the more grounded and normal of the two. All of this is crammed into the opening without feeling rushed, so when a catastrophe happens, we’re already familiar with Ines and her world.

This opening gives us a grasp of what’s normal for Ines. So, after her traumatic event, we can see that her life seemingly returns to normal. She’s back in the recording studio doing dub tracks and she’s back singing with her choir. The only things that change are her voice and a rise in the number of her dreams. But neither thing feels that alarming or unusual at first. Plus, it’s at this point that her mum shows up to help her recover from her trauma and a organist appears to rekindle her love life. They both help to enforce the normalcy of Ines’ life by appearing in the mundanity of it. But something just doesn’t feel quite right. Her life feels a bit like uncanny valley.

The director, Natalia Meta uses Ines’ dreams to establish the dream world as another place that exists beside Ines’ reality. It’s so close to her reality that we slip between the two with ease. The transition between the two worlds are aided by the darkness of Ines’ life. She moves from her dark apartment to the dark studio recording rooms and artificially lit choir hall and is never spotted in daylight. As she’s inside for most of the film, it’s hard to know what time of day it is at any point. As a result, we lose track of time, and with it our hold on reality. It’s hard to pinpoint when she’s dreaming or awake. The darkness facilitates the creation of Ines’ dream world and it’s merging with her everyday reality.

Head to our AFI Fest Hub for more reviews and short films from AFI Fest 2020.

Farewell Amor – AFI Fest 2020

Farewell Amor follows a father reunited with his wife and daughter after 17 years living apart. It starts with their reunion in New York airport and then splits into three parts to replay each of their experiences of their first few days back together. This allows us to see each of their perspectives in order to understand each of them better. Whilst each of them see things differently, they all highlight the struggle of living together after a long time apart.

Their first few days together feels pretty awkward. There’s a clash of cultures between Walter and Esther, the reunited couple. Walter has become accustomed to U.S. culture after 17 years living in New York. He’s created a new life for himself with the immigrant community around him. By contrast, Esther hasn’t had the privilege of officially starting a new life, as she’s been waiting for her U.S. visa. To perhaps deal with the struggle and uncertainty of their long distance relationship, she has found peace and happiness in becoming a stronger christian. Their different paths have caused Esther to become more strict and passive whilst Walter has become accustomed to a more free and open way of life in the U.S. It’s shown in the treatment of Sylvia (their daughter) and in what they do in their free time: Walter dances whilst Esther cleans and shops. They’ve each grown apart over time.

However, the tone of the movie makes it feel like their differences can be worked out. Instead of emphasizing the drama in their new conflicting personalities, Farewell Amor uses a relaxed pace to give time for us to get to see each character through their own eyes. It makes it feel like the characters, like us, can see both sides of each other. That whilst they’re all struggling to adjust to their new lives together, they all know they’ve been through the hardest part and just need to persevere to make things work.

It’s a refreshing American made film about the African experience that focuses on family relationships instead of the usual war driven (Beasts of No Nation) and exceptional African (Mandela films, Boy Who Harnessed the Wind, Queen of Katwe) narratives.

Head to our AFI Fest Hub for more reviews and short films from AFI Fest 2020.

Eyimofe (This Is My Desire) – AFI Fest 2020

Eyimofe is split into two stories. One features Mofe, a middle aged man who works as an electrician and lives with his sister and her children. The other features Rosa, a young woman who works as a hairdresser that takes care of her younger, pregnant sister. They share two obvious things in common. Firstly, they’re both trying to escape Lagos by obtaining visas to emigrate to Europe. Secondly, they’re both struggling to get by. Together, they represent a desire to escape poverty.

However, their visas definitely don’t seem legitimate. Mofe tries to obtain his from a guy with a computer that works at a stall in the middle of the street. Rosa’s method is worse, as she’s found a local mafiosa woman that has offered to get her and her sister visas in exchange for their baby. Their methods are symbolic of the global apartheid that restrict the underprivileged from freedom of movement. As we saw in AFI Fest’s I Carry You With Me and Farewell Amor, the legal routes for obtaining a visa to ‘the West’ are extremely limited for those without money.

Their lives aren’t just affected by their inability to get visas. They’re also stuck in the bureaucracy of inadequate social welfare at home. After Mofe’s sister dies, he gets caught in a long process of different forms and fees he has to fill out and pay before her death can be resolved. We see the whole process, from paying the morgue where the body is interred through to settling the inheritance. Likewise, Rosa has to fork out endless fees and debts to help out her pregnant sister. In contrast, life for the middle and upper class is a breeze. Mofe’s wealthy father can hire an expensive lawyer to swoop in and claim his daughter’s inheritance even if he hasn’t seen her for 10 years. And Rosa’s new American boyfriend can suddenly ghost her when she needs him for financial support. The wealthy can take advantage of the underprivileged (Mofe and Rosa) when they’re up, and avoid them as soon as they’re asked to help.

Eyimofe is a two part film which captures the wealth and class divide in Lagos. When you’re doing OK, you’re allowed independence and respect, but as soon as you meet hardship, everyone avoids you or takes advantage.

Head to our AFI Fest Hub for more reviews and short films from AFI Fest 2020.

Downstream to Kinshasa – AFI Fest 2020

The story of Downstream to Kinshasa starts with the Six Day War from 2000. Unlike the more famous 6 Day War fought between Israel and Egypt, this one was fought between Uganda and Rwanda in the eastern part of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Everything centered on the town of Kisangani where approximately 4,000 people were killed and 3,000 injured.

Among the survivors was director Dieudo Hamadi. In the Q&A for the film, he mentions that he was 15 or 16 during the conflict and doesn’t remember much about it. But on one return to his hometown his memories of the war were triggered from meeting a group of people (who become the focus of this documentary) that were disabled by it. He was privileged in being able to reconstruct a normal life and forget about the war, whilst others were permanently scared by it.

He was not the only one that forgot. And if one man who lived the war had lost his memories of it, it’s not too surprising that the rest of the town and country have forgotten the war too and the victims of it.

In Downstream to Kinshasa, we follow a group of people disabled by the war. They travel to the capital to make their story heard after it seems to have fallen on deaf ears at home. They want reparations from the country that refused to protect them.

Throughout their time in Kisangani and through their journey to Kinshasa, they’re shot going about their lives. One of the most incredible sections is their journey on a flat topped cargo boat down the Congo river. It’s transformed into a moving village with makeshift protection against the elements. It’s a multi-day journey that reminded me of the desert crossing migrants in Tenere.

Whilst they’re journeying, the director cuts between their present reality on their journey and shots of the group performing on the stage. The present documents their hope for change and their disabilities as we see it, whilst the shots of them performing on stage shows their story as they tell it. Their stage play appears self-deriding and built for a popular audience, but intertwining it in the documentary empowers their story. Simply including their experiences, as they tell it, validates them. They’re heard by more people thanks to this film. And in the context of their journey to the capital, including their story as they tell it emboldens their storytelling before they face their ultimate test – convincing the politicians and public in the capital.

Head to our AFI Fest Hub for more reviews and short films from AFI Fest 2020.