The Two Faces of a Bamileke Woman
New York Times Critic’s Pick
•
1h 16m
Directed by Rosine Mbakam • Documentary • 2016 • 76 minutes
Rosine Mbakam left Cameroon at 27 to live in Belgium. Seven years later—having studied film and married a European—she returns to make what she calls a journey into darkness—to the village of her birth, and later to the capital city of Yaoundé, where her mother now lives most of the year.
In the village of Tonga, her mother, Mâ Brêh, shares memories of the horrors of the war against French colonizers, and of daily life for a Cameroonian woman in an arranged marriage—a fate Rosine herself barely escaped, leaving the family of an angry ex-fiance behind. As she spends more time with her mother and the women around her, Rosine reveals the strength of their solidarity and their ability to face adversity.
"Mbakam demonstrates a mastery of perspective, a rare ability to include the camera in community.” —The New York Times
“An honest, captivating documentary essay.” —Jagoda Murczyńska, AfryKamera Film Festival
Up Next in New York Times Critic’s Pick
-
Bamako
Directed by Abderrahmane Sissako • Drama • With Danny Glover, Aïssa Maïga, Tiécoura Traoré • 2006 • 117 minutes
An extraordinary trial is taking place in a residential courtyard in Bamako, the capital city of Mali. African citizens have taken proceedings against such international financial inst...
-
Mali Blues
Directed by Lutz Gregor • Documentary • With Fatoumata Diawara, Ahmed Ag Kaedi, Bassékou Kouyaté • 2016 • 93 minutes
The West African country of Mali is widely recognized as the birthplace of the blues, later carried by the transatlantic slave trade to America's cotton fields. Yet despite cent...
-
Harvard Beats Yale 29-29
Directed by Kevin Rafferty • Documentary • With Vic Gatto, Brian Dowling , Tommy Lee Jones
• 2008 • 105 minutesAn incredible true story that unfolds like "a ripping good yarn... with an uproarious, impossible Hollywood ending" (Andrew O'Hehir, Salon.com), Harvard Beats Yale 29-29 is filmmaker...
