Makena Diop

Nigerian farmer Mocktar comes to Essakane, a dusty gold mining camp in Burkina Faso, seeking work. Haunted by a tragedy-laden past, Mocktar stoically adapts to the horrid working conditions of his fellow miners. Enter the beautiful widow Coumba, who shares Mocktar's endurance but dreams of a better life.

The true story of the rise to power and brutal assassination of the formerly vilified and later redeemed leader of the independent Congo, Patrice Lumumba. Using newly discovered historical evidence, Haitian-born and later Congo-raised writer and director Raoul Peck renders an emotional and tautly woven account of the mail clerk and beer salesman with a flair for oratory and an uncompromising belief in the capacity of his homeland to build a prosperous nation independent of its former Belgian overlords. Lumumba emerges here as the heroic sacrificial lamb dubiously portrayed by the international media and led to slaughter by commercial and political interests in Belgium, the United States, the international community, and Lumumba's own administration; a true story of political intrigue and murder where political entities, captains of commerce, and the military dovetail in their quest for economic and political hegemony.

The star-stubbed cast includes Issac de Bankolè as Saar, a blind beggar, and Danny Glover as a corrupt president. In this often hilarious mix of politics and superstition, the beggars hamper the tourist industry yet play a necessary role opposite the lives of devout and wealthy Muslims. The agitated Minister of Public Health and Sanitation imposes a novel way of eliminating the problem.

Soriba Samb is a Senegalese who has just received a much sought after internship to study filmmaking in Paris. Soriba heads to Paris, accompanied by the five-year old son of a friend who he believes to be still living in Paris. On arrival he struggles to find the boy’s father. In addition to coping with his new internship, Soriba has to also spend time tracking down the boy’s father ‘Issa’.

A 20-year veteran of the Angolan civil war returns to the capital city of Luanda where he faces the challenges of assimilation and survival.

Maria, a Ukrainian doctor, comes to Portugal to spend a year with Greco, her husband who is also a doctor. Upon arrival at Faro airport she is the only person from Kiev approached by agents of Immigration and Customs that lead her to a room of interrogation, without any explanations. All this occurs because the authorities suspect that something illegal should be behind her trip, since she is from Eastern Europe and her husband is Senegalese.

The TGV? No, it is not the famous French high-speed train, but instead the rickety and colourful bus operated, driven, repaired and, if need be, pushed by the intrepid "Rambo". This time, the trip between Dakar, the capital of Senegal, and Conakry, the capital of Guinea, is outright dangerous: the road crosses the territory of the Bijagos, who have launched an unexpected and violent insurrection. Rambo finds several odd passengers (with a handful of sheep) who are ready, for various legitimate or untold reasons, to take every risk to reach Conakry. And the TGV sets off on an eventful journey...

Somewhere on the African continent in a small fishing village cut off from the rest of the world, the lives of five people are caught in a web of violence and passion. Loosely based on Othello, an exploration of the bonds between the West and Africa and between appearance and reality.