AfryKamera 2017

The AfryKamera festival is an interdisciplinary event gathering people fascinated with the colourful culture of Africa. It is the first festival in the East-central Europe promoting African cinematography. The festival will feature 70 screenings of feature films, documentaries, and short films all over Poland. The screenings will be accompanied with exhibitions, concerts, debates, and multimedia presentations.

AfryKamera Festival 2017 – Białystok
June 1st – 4th, Forum Cinema

June 1st
18:30 The Cursed Ones (Ghana, 100′, 12 zł)

June 2nd
18:15 Children of Africa – (100′, 12 zł)
20:15 Rain the Color of Blue with a Little Red in It (Niger, 75′, 12 zł)

June 3rd
17:30 I Shot Bi Kidude (United Kingdom, Tanzania, 74′, 12 zł)
19:00 The Blue Elephant (Egypt, 170′, 12 zł)

June 4th
18:30 Kimpa Vita: The Mother of The African Revolution (Democratic Republic of the Congo, 72′, 12 zł)

The Cursed Ones
director: Nana Obiri Yeboah
Ghana, 2015, 100′
Disillusioned reporter, Godwin, arrives in a West African village to cover the local festival, but soon finds himself swept up in a witch hunt. A series of misfortunes lead a village to accuse a young, mute girl of being a witch. Their pastor insists that the only hope of salvation lies in her exorcism and death. His compelling rhetoric and ability to incite fear into the people and threatens to tear their fragile world apart. Godwin, with the help of a young school teacher, attempts to save the girl’s life, bravely fighting back against corruption and false prophets. Based on true events, “The Cursed Ones” is a story of morality, religion, corruption and community in the heart of Africa.

Rain the Color of Blue with a Little Red in It
director: Christopher Kirkley
Niger, 2015, 75′
Starring guitarist Mdou Moctar, “Rain the Color of Blue with a Little Red in It” is a feature length fiction film, shot entirely in Agadez, Niger. The film tells the universal story of a musician trying to make it against all odds, set against the backdrop of the raucous subculture of Tuareg guitar. The protagonist, real life musician Mdou Moctar, must battle fierce competition from jealous musicians, overcome family conflicts, and endure the trials of love – all while coming to terms with one of the biggest barriers: himself.

Both a homage to “Purple Rain” and “The Harder They Come”, the film is based on the universal hero, the struggle of a musician to overcome a series of conflicts. While there are a plethora of films concerning the Tuareg guitar, all are documentaries. “Rain” is the first fiction film to explore the scene in this format, in a musical film that has already caught the attention of the public in Niger. “Rain” is the first fiction film ever shot in the Tuareg language.

I Shot Bi Kidude
director: Andy Jones
Great Britain, Tanzania, 2015, 74′
In 2012, Bi Kidude, fast-talking, chain-smoking, rebel-rocker and the oldest performer on the world music stage, was kidnapped at a reported age of 102. Award winning director Andy Jones returns to Zanzibar to investigate. This intensely personal journey reflects on the life and death of a legend and sees the director embroiled in the mystery of her last days on earth. “I Shot Bi Kidude” feels both familiar and exotic. Part love story, part drama, and part reflection on the enduring impact of fame and film, it is a reminder to people everywhere to do what makes us happy, while we can.

The Blue Elephant
director: Marwan Hamed
Egypt, 2014, 170′
Five years after the death of his wife and daughter, once brilliant psychiatrist Yehia Rashed (Karim Abdel Aziz) is forced to return to work at el Abbasya psychiatric hospital and gets assigned to the section for the criminally insane. On his first day there he finds his one time friend and fellow psychiatrist Sherif Al Kordy (Khalid Al Sawy) just transferred for evaluation, after being accused of brutally raping and murdering his wife. Struggling with the ghosts of his past, alcoholism, drugs, and seeing the love of his life, Lobna Al Kordy (Nelly Karim), Sherif’s sister, again after all these years, he tries to solve the mystery surrounding the death of his friend’s wife and figure out whether Sherif is really insane or if he is the one losing his mind.

Kimpa Vita: The Mother of The African Revolution
director: Ne Kunda Nlaba
Democratic Republic of the Congo, 2016, 72′
Born in 1684, after the decline of the Kongo Kingdom at the Battle of Ambwila, Kimpa Vita was a young woman and revolutionary from noble family of Kongo. In 1704, Kimpa Vita aged 20, began her revolution against slavery in Africa and particularly in the Kongo Kingdom in Central Africa. She was arrested and put on trial and then burnt alive with child and secretary by Portuguese on 2nd of July, 1706 in Mbanza, Kongo. After her death, many people and members of her Antonin movement were brought to America, Jamaica, Guadeloupe, Brazil and many more. Their descendants are among these communities called African Americans, West Indians and others. This documentary aims to be a historical and biographical film about life of Kimpa Vita. Throughout this documentary, Ne Kunda Nlaba wants the public discover the real life of Kimpa Vita and the Kongo Kingdom by also showing some historic sites, ruins and places, where major events took place.