Media Links

Cheikh Ndiaye

The Los Angeles Film Festival listed Cheikh Ndiaye’s film as Wrestling Grounds. It is also known as The Call of the Arena in English as well. The Poles, by the way, call it Zapaśnicy. This film was great. It was refreshing to see a contemporary film made by a relatively young African filmmaker calmly and openly addressing the theme of traditional Africa vs. Black Dada Nihilism. Angus Wolfe Murray goes straight to the sensual, “Girls are ever present, supportive and sensual appendages to the masculine ethos, far more seductive and valuable than the men like to admit.”

Russell Edwards for Variety.com laments, “While Ndiaye is good in the central role of Nalla and all other perfs are solid, pic loses some of its dynamism when Andre drops out of the narrative. Gueye, who plays Andre, is an actual professional wrestler and something of a superstar in Senegal. He dominates the screen, not just through sheer physicality but with a charming, reassuring presence most thesps would kill for. Pic never regains its full power until the emotional closing shot.” The brother he calls “Gueye,” by the way, makes Arnold Schwarzenegger look like a circus midget.

Since this film is not yet on DVD, my guess is that it might end up on a service like Jaman. This is another way of asking why Jaman has no “African” category on its site.

Aisha Bain

Very impressive: “Before joining Global Rights, Ms. Bain co-founded a project through which she traveled independently to Eastern Chad and Darfur to document the human rights abuses in those countries and to create an awareness campaign. The documentary she created, called Darfur Diaries: Message from Home, has already been screened for the UN Security Council, the House of Representatives of the US Congress with co-sponsorship from the Human Rights Caucus, and dozens of universities and other venues.” What’s impressive is that she traveled independently to these locations—no non-governmental-organization validation.

Christopher Brown

Documenting the African Palestinians: “Have you ever heard of the African Palestinians? Well if you have, you’re among the few in the outside world who can say so. African Palestinians have lived in Palestine for generations.”

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