African Film Festival 2023

African Film Festival 2023

The African Film Festival (AFF) has curated this collection of films that showcases the creativity, community, courage, good humor and resilience that Africans display in the face of great adversity.

The festival is dedicated to advancing an enhanced understanding of African culture through film. It offers diverse platforms for the wide distribution of African media through its flagship annual film festival and complementary year-round programming. AFF is committed to increasing visibility and recognition for African media artists by introducing African film and culture to a broad range of audiences in the United States and abroad, bypassing economic, class and racial barriers.

African Film Festival 2023
  • Trouble Sleep

    Directed by Alain Kassanda • Documentary • 2020 • 41 minutes

    Kassanda’s freewheeling urban portrait follows two young men, Fred and Akin, as they navigate the crowded roadways of Ibadan, Nigeria’s third largest city. Engineering graduate Fred is beginning a new job as a taxi driver, while Akin p...

  • Kigali Shaolin Temple

    Directed by Claire Mollard and Magali Chirouze • Documentary • 2013 • 52 minutes

    Kigali Shaolin Temple is a kung-fu club in Rwanda started by a group of orphans from the genocide. They find fulfillment in passing on their skills and teaching young Rwandans the values of sharing, tolerance and mu...

  • Mama Colonel

    Directed by Dieudo Hamadi • Documentary • 2017 • 72 minutes

    Colonel Honorine Manyole, commonly known as 'Mama Colonel,' works for the Congolese police force and heads the unit for the protection of minors and the fight against sexual violence. Having worked for 15 years in Bukavu, in the east of...

  • This is Nollywood

    Directed by Franco Sacchi • Documentary • 2007 • 56 minutes

    First came Hollywood, then Bollywood and now Nollywood, Nigeria’s booming film industry, which released 2000 feature features in 2006 alone. Where else can you shoot a full-length dramatic film for $10,000 in 7 days? Until recently litt...

  • Nice Colored Girls

    Directed by Tracey Moffatt • Drama • With Gayle Mabo, Cheryl Pitt, Janelle Court • 1987 • 16 minutes

    This stylistically daring film audaciously explores the history of exploitation between white men and Aboriginal women, juxtaposing the “first encounter” between colonizers and native women with ...

  • Everything Must Fall

    Directed by Rehad Desai • Documentary • 2018 • 85 minutes

    Can a diverse group of college kids find common ground with their school’s faculty and janitorial staff to bring the school administration to its knees? Can they banish a nation’s crippling student debt, guarantee workers benefits and liv...

  • They Are We

    Directed by Emma Christopher, Ph.D. • Documentary • 2014 • 79 minutes

    THEY ARE WE is the story of a remarkable reunion, 170 or so years after a family was driven apart by the ravages of the transatlantic slave trade. In Central Cuba, proud members of the Ganga-Longoba, a small Afro-Cuban ethnic ...

  • Thank You for the Rain

    Directed by Julia Dahr and Kisilu Musya • Documentary • 2017 • 87 minutes

    Five years ago Kisilu, a Kenyan farmer, started to use his camera to capture the life of his family, his village and the damages of climate change. When a violent storm throws him and a Norwegian filmmaker together we see ...

  • Chez Jolie Coiffure

    Directed by Rosine Mbakam • Documentary • 2018 • 70 minutes

    Sabine attaches a hair weave and gets to work. Her hands move quickly and precisely, as she tightly braids the hair in front of the sign in her salon promising African, European, and American-style coiffure. Sabine is a larger than-life...

  • As I Open My Eyes

    Directed by Leyla Bouzid • Drama • With Marwen Soltana, Youssef Soltana, Deena Abdelwahed, Lassaad Jamoussi, Aymen Omrani, Montassar Ayari, Ghalia Benali, Baya Medhaffar • 2015 • 102 minutes

    As I Open My Eyes gives us a look at Tunisian youth on the eve of the Jasmine Revolution as they are pull...

  • Aya of Yop City

    Directed by Marguerite Abouet, Clément Oubrerie • Animation • With Aissa Maiga, Eriq Ebouaney, Jacky Ido, Pascal N'Zonzi, Jean-Baptiste Anoumon • 2012 • 88 minutes

    Set against the vibrant backdrop of the Ivory Coast in the 1970s, AYA OF YOP CITY is a spirited and hilarious adaptation of the best...

  • I Am Somebody

    Directed by Madeline Anderson • Documentary • 1970 • 30 minutes

    In 1969, black female hospital workers in Charleston, South Carolina went on strike for union recognition and a wage increase, only to find themselves in a confrontation with the state government and the National Guard. Featuring An...