“Mama Bantu”
As the Academy searches for tactics for its Best International Feature category, the long-term foreign cinema in the United States looks brilliant. Although the Dominican Republic has only submitted 14 films to the Oscars since its debut, the country has sent programs each and every year since 2011. This year, the Caribbean country has selected an impressive candidate, even if the list of authors will be difficult to decipher.
Dominican filmmaker Ivan Herrera’s feature film of the moment, “Bantu Mama,” is a skillfully crafted and superbly filmed drama about a French woman of African descent who hides with a trio of disjointed young men in Santo Domingo. Told with art and conducted with tenderness, “Bantu Mama” maps the history of the African diaspora in the Caribbean into a compelling human story with a limited goal.
With a script co-written by Herrera and his lead actress Clarisse Albrecht, the story is a sublime synthesis of geography and identity, a fertile collaboration based on shared delight and connection to a position and culture. Taking pieces from her own past, Albrecht plays Emma, or Emmanuel, a single French Cameroonian living in France. When we meet her, she lives alone with her friendly grey parrot, preparing for a trip abroad. After checking into a luxury hotel, he makes a braid on the beach through a local woman, who first speaks to him in Spanish before switching to French.
“I would love to spend one day in Africa,” the woman tells Emma. “Me too,” she replies. In a charming bird’s-eye view, surrounded by the artificial aquamarine blue of the hotel pool, a phone call takes her out of her self-absorption. to the airport. The scene fades when he stumbles upon the officers’ questions, a sniffer dog barks in the background. It receives an unexpected blow when the vehicle transporting it is hit head-on and crawls into a nearby river.
Upon hearing her cries for help, she is discovered through two large teenagers, Tina (Scarlet Reyes) and Shulo (Arturo Pérez), who were passing by on her moped. her roommate Cuki (Euris Javiel) attracts her. Curious to meet the mysterious surrogate they have adopted, they offer to help her without asking too many questions. A Maasai warrior. With the simplicity of a childish curiosity, Cuki asks the central question of the film: “How can you be Bantu and French?
They slowly become something like a family, speaking sparingly but enough to identify a relationship. The script is minimalist, while conveying the main points of the plot. We never see Tina’s father and Shulo’s uncle, but he is identified as an influential gang leader in the neighborhood. While Shulo spends her days rapping and running errands for her uncle, Tina intends to help Emma. A fierce negotiator, she vows to make sure she returns home if Emma plans to take Cuki with her. “If you help me, I will help you,” he repeats solemnly. He deserves a genuine life. “
Albrecht carries the story with elegance, and the 3 young actors are stunning in their own way, humming with a naturalism full of life. They have a lot to say with their appearance and physique, a fact that Herrera and cinematographer Sebastian Cabrera Chelin use ingeniously. The film carries its intimate pocket flavor with confidence, and is bathed in a soft, dusty saturated that filters magnificently through the small apartment. Some chronological shots of birds and kites dancing in the wind sign a transparent message: the appeal of freedom is visible, still outside r.
A well-crafted film from an emerging filmmaker, “Bantu Mama” probably wouldn’t have the emotional or political clout to secure him a coveted Oscar nomination. among auteur film enthusiasts who enjoy elegantly directed drama. Like its soft characters scattered across the ocean, “Bantu Mama” jumps to unite amid noise.
“Mama Bantu” is now available on Netflix.
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