beach town

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Granma Nineteen and the Soviet’s Secret – PAFF 2020

Granma Nineteen and the Soviet’s Secret takes us back to Jaki’s childhood living in a coastal African town with his Granma, family, and friends. There’s no sign of school or any other schedule filling activities for young Jaki, so he creates his own entertainment with his friends Pi and Charlita. They start investigating the construction site of a huge mausoleum guarded by Russian soviets. Their innocent adventures uncover the Russian’s plot to demolish their neighborhood, so they plan to foil it by setting off their secret explosives.

Granma Nineteen and the Soviet’s Secret revolves around Jaki’s childhood in the 1980s. The characters give the film (and award winning African novel by Ondjaki) its flavor. There’s Jaki and his two friends, a trio of innocent adventurers that Americans will recognize from many 1980s U.S. films such as The Goonies or E.T. There’s a loving Granma that never loses her spirit even when her toe is covered in gangrene. You’ll also meet two foreigners fighting for her company in a Portuguese speaking Russian and a Spanish speaking Cuban doctor. None of the characters are threatening or unfriendly, even ‘Sea Foam’, the only homeless man in the film is friendly and happy. It creates the kind of neighborhood you wished you grew in.

The film is also told in flash back, of an older Jaki reminiscing on his childhood. This flash back narrative adds to films saudade, a classic feeling in Portuguese language novels and films which describes feelings of longing, melancholy, or nostalgia for an object that you’ll probably never have again. In this case, it’s Jaki’s saudade for his happy and innocent childhood. The director emphasizes his good memories by coloring the memories of his childhood town in warm pastel colors and filling the story with only happy memories. Eradicating the greys and downplaying the threat of the Soviet construction work and the absence of Jaki’s parents keeps the story positive in a way that only a person looking back on their life with saudade could.

Whilst I haven’t read Ondjaki’s novel, João Ribeiro’s adaptation is a heart warming coming of age story told through the rose tinted lenses of Jaki looking back on his childhood.

Head to our Pan African Film Festival Hub for more reviews from PAFF 2020.

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Sea and Jungle (Mionga Ki Obo) – Welcome to Sao Joao dos Angolares

Sea and Jungle

Sea and Jungle FILM DIFFICULTY RANKING: 2

Angolares are the oldest inhabitants of the island of São Tomé. Control of the island was wrested from them in the late 19th century, and their descendants have been reduced to a small fishing community sitting on the border of the sea and jungle. Sea and Jungle explores the tangled history of the Angolares and the island of São Tomé.

From: São Tomé & Principe, Africa
Watch: YouTube, IMDb
Next: Golden Fish, African Fish, Batuque, Inland Sea

Sea and Jungle – The Breakdown

Sea and Jungle starts as a narrated documentary. The filmmaker, Ângelo Torres, talks through an introduction to the remote fishing village of Sao Joao dos Angolares in the southern part of São Tomé (the main island of São Tomé and Principe) alongside shots of village life. There’s only 2,500 people living here on this strip of land bordering the Sea and Jungle (Mionga Ki Ôbo). The narrated documentary start gives the viewer a foundational understanding of the place and heritage (these people are the oldest inhabitants of the island following their escape from slavery) before the filmmaker grounds us in some local interviews.

The majority of the interview subjects are part of the fishing community of the village. They tell stories of the sea to give us a living perspective of the island to add to the director’s introduction. Some are functional, like the fish saleswoman that details how she funds her entrepreneurial job, whilst some are more emotional, like the traumatic story from a fisherman that hasn’t gone out to sea for four years after a near death experience. There’s also an interview with the island’s godfather type – a white man who’s the go-to money lender for the island and literal godfather to 117 local children. His white skin is a sign that the Portuguese colonial legacy on the island perhaps hasn’t fully passed. Whilst the sequence of interviews doesn’t develop a story or any themes, the interviews with the locals give a more vivid depiction of life in Sao Joao dos Angolares.

Some of the interviews are broken up by improvisational dance and dramatic reenactments of some of the stories. These interludes add a dreaminess to the documentary that runs with the narrator’s musings and mystical interview questions. The dreamy, mystical tone makes the interviewee’s references to superstitions seem more normal. There’s the man who doesn’t each shark because it might be the shark that ate his father, the boat makers that cut the trees for the canoes on specific moon-lit nights, and the doctors that summon spirits to help them cure their neighbors. However, the creative dreaminess is not fully embraced – the film doesn’t go full Fausto in it’s originality. It also doesn’t focus one theme; jumping between local fishing stories, superstitions, historical narrative, and improvisational scenes which dilute the film’s focus. But if you’re looking for an interesting documentary capturing life from a small town on a small African island country, Sea and Jungle does it’s job.

What to Watch Next

There’s a few more interesting African documentaries that center on life by the sea. Golden Fish, African Fish opens a window on Senegal’s many fisherman whilst Batuque will let you listen to Cape Verde’s national music. Or for a dreamy docudrama from another island nation, check out Mauritius’ The Cathedral. In Search of Voodoo also does a similar job of capturing one aspect of a country’s culture.

You could also check out Inland Sea from Japan if you’re looking for more fishing related documentaries from around the world.