NEXT TO LAST FILMS from the Black International Cinema, Berlin

In addition to Dar He and Africa:  the Beat, there are three other films that I saw at the Black International Cinema festival in Berlin that bear special mention.  These are Askoo, a short film from Iranian filmmaker Mohammad Ali Hashemzehi:  Shahde Sang/the Nectar of Stones, another short from Iranian filmmaker Sattar Chamani Gol:  and A Manina Dos Ojhos Grandes/Girl with Big Eyes, a feature-length dramatic narrative by Cape Verdian filmmaker Alexis Tsafas.

Askoo is a 25 minute short fim that has been in several documentary film festivals.  It was shot in Baluchi with English subtitles.

It is about a man and his camel.  The man in question is a camel dealer.  Apart from his herd, he has one camel that is both his mount and companion, and that is Askoo.   

His relationship with Askoo is somewhat like what, in other parts of the world, you’d expect to develop with your dog, or perhaps more appropriately, with your horse in the days when horses were a primary means of travel.  Because the camel dealer spends most of his time alone in semi-arid regions with his camels, his relationship with Askoo is very important to him.

At work on "Askoo."  Filmmaker Mohammad Ali Hashemzehi is on the right.

And there is history involved in this relationship. As the film develops, we learn that there has been a major conflict between our camel dealer and Askoo.  At the very end, in an off-hand way, we are finally led to understand the reason for this conflict.

The movie is charming.  There is the interesting, “exotic,” side of seeing what life is like for a camel dealer in the backlands of Iran, but the hints dropped about the conflict are what really draw us in.  My one major criticism of the film is that there was something important lost in the translation.  (What in the world is “brambles?”)  As a parting note, Askoo the camel certainly has big, beautiful eyes.

A scene from "Ashkoo."

The second film, Shahde Sang/the Nectar of Stones, is also by an Iranian filmmaker.  It´s in Kurdishm, with English subtitles.

This 25 minute short film takes us up a steep, rocky, barren mountain with three men set on getting something that is, we are led to understand, still available on the cliff face.  It is a long journey they make, and at the end of it, one of them (who is doing this “for the last time”) must be hoisted up to the middle of the cliff face by the two others.   

Plenty of drama here:  will the two tire and let their friend drop down to certain death?  Will the bees (yes, halfway up the cliff’s face, he encounters a bee’s nest) sting him so badly that he lets go of the rope?  Will this, his last journey, end in his death or in his getting what they came after?

Askoo the camel with the films´lead, the very personable camel dealer seen from the back.

We only learn more than halfway through the film, and much of the way through the dramatic cliff-hanging part, what they are after:  honey, made by bees that have their nest… in a hole halfway up the cliff.  To cut to the quick, yes, he gets the honey without dying.  His companions lower him back down to safety, and the three of them…consume all the honey that they just spent most of the day getting, at the risk of the life of one of them.

It is quite humorous in sections, happily, by intention.  Would I ever go through all that for a feast of honey?  No way.  And in places, the drama was a little forced.  But:  did I enjoy the film?  Absolutely.

Note that I was unable to contact Sattar Chamani Gol, the filmmaker responsible for this film, and so don´t have any photos related to him/her or the movie Shahde Sang/the Nectar of Stones.

OUR NEXT BLOG will be about a film from Cape Verde.  This will be the last film we´ll cover from the Black International Cinema, Berlin.

Africa: the Beat -- that other really fine movie from the festival

I mentioned that there were two films that really stood out in the Black International Cinema festival in Berlin.  Let me remind you that I did NOT see every entry, but I did see an awful lot.  This second film, Africa:  the Beat, is a truly fine and moving production, a documentary very skillfully filmed (with little in the way of fancy equipment) in Nzali, Tanzania.

The producers-directors are a cooperative called Samaki Wanne that consists of four people: a filmmaker, a painter, and two musicians.  The mover and shaker is Polo Vallejo (far right in the photo below), a musician who spent over 15 years visiting and learning about the Wagogo of Tanzania, and decided as a result of his research that it would be important to make a film about them.  The Wagogo are a tribe for whom music is an essential part of daily life, of the passing of the year, of the different stages of life, of their relationship to their environment...in brief, an essential part of their existence.

Samaki Wanne--Manuel Velasco, Javier Arias Bal, Pablo Vega & Polo Vallejo (Photo:  Carmen Ballvé)

The cooperative decided early on to make the film without the use of a voice-over or any other kind of detailed narration.  The Wagogo, obviously, are not speaking (or singing) in any of the language with which most viewers will be familiar.  So why did the cooperative decide against a narrative?

Their aim, and it is to their great credit that they achieve this aim, is to let the music and the images speak for themselves.  Polo Vallejo explained, for example, that every cut is dictated by the rhythm of the music.  Their are a few frames with a bare minimum of printed words (spring, the harvest...) but for the most part, we simply see and experience the  complex rhythm of the Wagogo´s life through their music, and their dance.

Aside from the wonderful vicarious experience that this provides the audience, I was interested to learn from Vallejo that only the Wagogo women are allowed to play the drums, and the drums are a very important part of their music.  In many forms of music, most or all of the drummers are men, so it is intriguing to find a peoples with such a different tradition.

A Wagogo musican with his dog.  Photo:  Carmen Vallavé

One of the aspects of this film that I found particularly attractive is the beauty of the music and the dance.  This is due both to the intrinsic merit of the music and dance, and also to the skill of the filmmakers.  I can easily imagine a film in which the music and dance could be made uninteresting by filmmakers unable to let them shine through.  My congratulations, then, to the Samaki Wanne cooperative.

In addition to its screening at Black International Cinema, Berlin, Africa:  the Beat has been accepted into film festivals in New York (USA), Montreal (Canada), Florence (Italy), the Canary Islands (Spain), Zanzibar (Tanzania) and others.  If you have the chance, I certainly recommend that you go to see it.

OUR NEXT POST will be about a few of the other films from Black International Cinema, Berlin--then, we will return to Afro-Peruvian music and dance.