Renowned filmmakers Abderrahmane Sissako and John Akomfrah will be in dialogue at Film Africa, which takes place in the UK from October 25 to November 3. The festival will also feature a screening of the former’s latest film, Black Tea, to close the festival.
The Mauritanian director will engage with Akomfrah in a conversation to be moderated by film curator June Givanni on 2 November at the Ciné Lumière. The conversation, per the organisers, will provide attendees the chance to “hear first-hand about the challenges and triumphs the two visionaries have faced throughout their careers”.
The festival would also screen Mati Diop’s Dahomey to open the festival, which will also feature films as diverse as Moyo, a Tanzanian film directed by Henry J. Kamara, and Chikha, a Moroccan film directed by Ayoub Layyoussifi and Zahoua Raji.
Other screenings include Kubolor, a Ghanaian film by Gabriel Kwami Agbolo Efoe and Cherif Douamba, One Day from Ivory Coast, Finding Serenity from Nigeria, and Where My Memory Began from Sierra Leone.
Attendees can look forward to a symposium on African Cinema Restoration and Restitution, which will take place on October 26. The symposium will feature a “diverse range of voices, including filmmakers, archivists, scholars, and cultural policymakers”.
Speaking at the symposium are Didi Cheeka, a Nigerian archivist and researcher, Pedro Pimenta, a Mozambican producer and archivist, Cecilia Cenciarelli from Italy’s Cineteca di Bologna, Aboubakar Sanogo, an expert on African film heritage and key figure in the African Film Heritage Project and FEPACI, and Mohamed Challouf, a Tunisian archivist and filmmaker. Givanni will also moderate the symposium.
Presented by the UK’s Royal African Society, the Film Africa festival has been held since 2011. Its two awards are the Baobab Award for Best Short Film and the Audience Award for Best Feature Film.
