 Click for the big picture |
Kini & Adams |
 Idrissa Ouedraogo Click for the big picture |
'I don't represent my continent as such, but if I win the Palme d'Or, I know that young people in Africa will be proud in the same way that they're proud of a footballer like George Weah or a musician like Youssou N'Dour.' Idrissa Ouedraogo is talking about his new feature, Kini & Adams, which follows his 1990 Grand Jury Prize winner, Tilai, into competition at Cannes. A small-scale ($2 million), English-language story about a pair of irrepressible dreamers who yearn to escape the rural backwaters of their home village and head for the bright lights of the city, it is both a celebration of friendship and a trenchant little allegory about the destructive effects of ambition. Its key symbol is the battered old car which Kini and Adams decide to renovate. They lavish attention on the upholstery, but somehow they never get round to making the vehicle actually work.
'I think Adams loves Kini,' Ouedraogo muses, 'they can't do anything without each other. But Kini has a wife and child, Adams doesn't.' Inevitably, there is a betrayal. After a building site is opened in the village, one man becomes the other's boss. 'When Adams loves, he really loves. He has a good heart. He becomes very weak at the end not because he is a bad man, but because he needs love. He is nothing without his friends.'
The film was shot in Zimbabwe, with a French-Zimbabwean crew and South African actors. This, Ouedraogo suggests, should not be construed as an abandonment of Burkina Faso. 'But we need to develop a popular theatre of our own. The South African actors have far more experience than ours do."
Kini is played by Vusi Kunene, a veteran stage and film actor whose previous credits include Cry Freedom and The Beloved Country, while well-known South African TV actor David Mohloki takes the part of Adams. Ouedraogo gave extensive coaching to the one newcomer in his cast, Netsayi Chigwendere, reportedly making her repeat one crucial scene more than thirty times.
Ouedraogo confesses to a certain exasperation at the patronising way in which Europeans continue to regard African cinema. 'They read our films at the first level. They think African cinema is always the same thing.' In Tilai (1990) and Yaaba (1989) he was dealing with complex human emotions, but many western critics persisted in treating the films as if they were quaint slices of African village folklore. 'People in Europe should learn a little bit about our culture,' he sighs.
Ouedraogo made the film in English (not his first language) rather than French because, as he puts it, 'Africa is very big and the English-speaking part is very important.' For African cinema to grow, he believes it is vital for African movies to reach African audiences. Outside the big cities, he points out, there are relatively few cinemas. Film enthusiasts in remote villages will still have the chance to see Kini & Adams, albeit in conditions a long way removed from the splendour of the Palais du Cinéma: there are plans to screen the film throughout Africa on video and on 16mm. 'If we want to be independent, we have to create our own market.'
Asked what gave him the idea for Kini & Adams, Ouedraogo pauses and says he is not sure. 'But I wanted to do a film that was not too expensive, and after five features, I decided to change direction a little.'
Shot against the dry, dusty backdrop of the Zimbabwean countryside, Kini & Adams doesn't boast the exquisite visuals of Yaaba and Tilai. Despite the many moments of humour, it's a harsh, determinedly unsentimental piece of storytelling. (Oeudraogo even changed the original title, La traversée du jour, because he believed it sounded too romantic.)
Making Kini & Adams was clearly a liberating experience for a director terrified of repeating himself.'It has taken me years to find this voice,' he recently observed, 'after four or five films, you have nothing to say because you think you've said it all already. But God gave me a second wind.' Geoffrey Macnab
Prod Co: Noe Productions, Les Films De La Plaine, Polar Productions, Framework International
Prods: Cedomir Kolar, Sophie Salbot, Frederique Dumas
Dir: Idrissa Ouedraogo
Scr: Idrissa Ouedraogo, Olivier Lorelle, Santiago Amigorena
Ph: Jean-Paul Meurisse
Art Dir: Heather Cameron
Ed: Monica Coleman
Cast: Vusi Kunene, David Mohloki, Nithati Moshesh
Running Time: 93 minutes
Int Sales: The Sales Company
