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MEDI1TV Afrique : Le taxi, le cinéma et moi: entre quête et espoir - 10/06/2023
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00:00 It's with great pleasure that we meet you again on Mediain TV for this new Escalculture
00:15 in the heart of Africa.
00:16 And besides, in a few minutes we will focus on one of the greatest photographers of our
00:21 continent, Samuel Fosso, who has renewed and radicalized, but in the good sense of the
00:27 term, the art of self-portrait.
00:28 Otherwise, we will be pleased to discover together one of the young cinematographic talents
00:35 of Morocco.
00:36 It's a young woman, her name is Esma El Moundier, she won the award for the staging
00:40 at the last Cannes Film Festival in the section "Un Certain Regard" with her film "Mother
00:45 of All", the lies to superb documentary that we will be pleased to talk about.
00:50 Otherwise, first of all, we talk about cinema again, always with a documentary that made
00:54 us vibrate, the text "If cinema and I signed", salam, without any hesitation, and we receive it
00:59 right away.
01:00 And as promised, we talk about cinema right away with a documentary that focuses on the
01:12 filmmaker Drissa Touré, a superb documentary, very vibrant, very poignant, and which highlights
01:19 cinema on our continent.
01:21 And to talk about it, who better than the director in person, salam, without hesitation,
01:25 makes us happy to be with us.
01:27 Hello.
01:28 Hello.
01:29 So, it's a pleasure for me to be invited to your set to talk about the film "The Taxi,
01:38 the Cinema and Me".
01:39 I am very happy to be invited.
01:42 And we are more than happy to welcome you.
01:44 Thank you for responding to our invitation.
01:47 And it's true that your documentary is a small cinematographic UFO in the current African
01:53 cinematographic landscape.
01:55 We had a huge heart attack and that's why we wanted to welcome you today.
02:00 Moreover, the main idea, the main idea of the film is very original.
02:05 And how did this idea come to you?
02:08 Was it a bit of a coincidence, perhaps a coincidence of a meeting, or is it something
02:12 that sprang up in you?
02:16 First of all, thank you.
02:18 It must be said that this meeting with Dili, very saturated, was not done by chance.
02:24 I met the man first through his works at the school of cinema such as Lada and Aramuja.
02:33 And later, in my professional activities, we organized an activity called the Café
02:42 Cinema, where he was invited.
02:44 I think the outburst came from there.
02:47 We thought that this gentleman should be accompanied because I also came across a
02:53 report by France-O where it was said that the filmmaker Bokinabé Drissatouré, Abubo
03:00 Dulaso, who lives in a very great precariousness.
03:05 And for me it was very important to immortalize this gentleman because it is a problem of
03:12 African cinema.
03:14 This gentleman who carried the flame of Bokinabé cinema, of African cinema, who
03:19 finds himself for 22 years marginalized, forgotten by everyone in a small town in
03:26 Burkina Faso.
03:27 For me, making this film was more than important because as a young director, we
03:33 also ask ourselves questions about the future of African cinema.
03:37 So this meeting with Drissatouré was not done by chance.
03:42 Unconsciously, I also had Drissatouré because I had seen his films.
03:48 This gentleman who is really extraordinary, who created his own cinematographic writing
03:57 called the writing of the century.
03:59 I think there was this desire to go and discover it more.
04:04 And then with Drissatouré, what is most touching is that he is an autodidact.
04:10 He did not go to a cinema school, he does not even have a certificate of study and
04:14 managed to make such films that were selected in the largest festivals in the world, such
04:20 as Cannes, Locarno.
04:22 I think this gentleman deserves it more.
04:25 So this documentary, I find it welcome and from the bottom of my heart, I think that
04:33 somehow he will be able to revive, somehow he will be able to redo his profession that he loved.
04:40 I would also like to know, Salam Sanpaligré, why did you choose the documentary format?
04:46 Was it a deliberate choice on your part?
04:50 Yes, absolutely.
04:52 It was a deliberate choice.
04:54 I think it's more than that.
04:56 The documentary is really the real thing.
04:59 People have been able to discover his story because for a long time this gentleman was
05:05 stuck in this little town where we no longer spoke about it.
05:09 It's very important.
05:11 I think it's African cinema that with all its problems, problems of training, distribution
05:19 problems, production problems.
05:22 I think this cinema deserves to be listened to, to have an attentive ear.
05:31 Because for a long time we haven't stopped talking about the problems of African cinema.
05:36 And I think there are a lot of risks in the different countries, whether in Burkina Faso,
05:41 Côte d'Ivoire, Mali, a little bit everywhere in South Africa, Sahara and even everywhere.
05:47 So I think making this film is about solving the problem so that we can finally reflect
05:53 and say to ourselves, what can we really do so that African cinema can move forward?
05:59 What can we do so that the authors, the directors, the filmmakers can live with dignity in their profession?
06:08 And it's all in your honour.
06:10 And what I would like to know, it's true that your documentary is at the same time a
06:13 bit of a reminder, there is also a sociological aspect, but it's also a tribute to these
06:20 pioneers of cinema on our continent, who thanks to them, we have this new generation
06:26 who are taking up the torch.
06:29 Is that a bit of all that at the same time?
06:31 And is there anything else, Salam San Paligre?
06:36 Yes, for me, this film is a tribute to African cinema, African cinema with its tribulations,
06:44 African cinema with its hope that it carries for the different nations.
06:52 So for me, making this film is also a tribute to all these pioneers.
06:59 I mentioned Samben Ousmane, I mentioned Ghibry El Diok Mambeti, all these people who
07:05 fought, who often did not even go to film school, they simply had this passion, they
07:10 wanted to express themselves.
07:13 Because for a long time, cinema was very empty of our screens.
07:18 For a long time, we have been invaded by images that come from the outside.
07:24 And to paraphrase the filmmaker Gnabel Gaston Caborey, who said that as Africans as we
07:30 are, we will remain confined to the status of consumers of television and cinematographic
07:37 images designed and produced by others, we will become sub-citizens of this world.
07:43 And through this film, I also wanted to show that we do not want to be sub-citizens and
07:49 that we also want to express ourselves.
07:52 There is a new generation with a new way of seeing things, of telling stories.
07:59 And I think this film calls for that, for these elders who were in a much more militant
08:06 cinema, such as Samben Ousmane, a very committed cinema.
08:12 And the new generation of filmmakers, who despite the difficulties, who say to themselves,
08:19 there is still a future, we will go there and we will reinvent ourselves, as Driss Atouré
08:25 did at the time with his writing of the film "Sek", we said to ourselves, we will reinvent
08:31 our own cinematography.
08:33 And I think that Africa has a very bright future at this level.
08:37 And it's true, you say it very well, this balance between the new generation and the
08:43 old generation of filmmakers on our continent.
08:46 And your personal view as an African, but also as a filmmaker, what is your view
08:53 on the current cinematographic industry on our continent, Salam San Paligre?
08:58 To tell you, for a long time I was pessimistic because I knew cinema quite early, because
09:08 Burkina has one of the largest African festivals, the FESPACO.
09:14 I met a lot of African filmmakers, I went to follow the meetings.
09:20 For a long time, we have not stopped talking about the problems of African cinema, because
09:29 it must be said, African cinema is not supported.
09:33 African filmmakers, authors, always appeal to the same funding.
09:38 There is the International Organization of Francophonie, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs
09:44 in France.
09:45 And I think we need to stop supporting African cinema in this sense.
09:51 Our states will have to try to reflect, to create tracks.
09:57 For example, Senegal, which I cite as an example, has understood.
10:01 Senegal has a fund called FOPICA, which is intended for this annual child, where there
10:08 is a fund that is allocated, which allows authors, filmmakers, to make films.
10:15 I think it is very important.
10:17 We, African filmmakers, we, authors, must be able to have the support of our own states
10:26 through these funds.
10:28 Once we have the money from us, we can also go and ask abroad.
10:34 Because whatever we say to the one who reaches out, is always below.
10:41 I think African cinema deserves more than that.
10:46 We have to stop being in this competition.
10:50 You know how many African filmmakers are here.
10:53 All these filmmakers should appeal to the same funding, these same funding, which are
10:58 two or three or four or five funding, which are in Europe.
11:01 I think that's not the future of cinema.
11:04 Cinema is very important for our society.
11:08 Cinema is very important for Africa.
11:10 And it will also be necessary that there is a real cinematographic policy in our states.
11:18 Some states have understood this, but I think there is still work to be done.
11:23 We have to try to inject a lot of money so that young people, the elderly, so that
11:30 everyone can express themselves and that we stop fighting for the same money.
11:34 I think that African cinema is not yet out of the oven.
11:40 There are still a lot of difficulties at all levels.
11:44 But I trust, I trust because we have, as I said and would have said,
11:50 there is a new generation of African filmmakers who have a way of seeing things,
11:57 of telling things.
11:59 And they are talented.
12:01 They just need to be accompanied so that African cinema can exist elsewhere.
12:09 For example, this year at the Cannes Film Festival, I was very happy to see that Africa
12:14 was a little more represented.
12:16 And it will have to be like that annually.
12:19 African cinema will have to be everywhere in the world.
12:22 And it's very important.
12:24 Cinema is very important for our society.
12:28 And it's true that it's thanks to people like you that African cinema is shining a little
12:35 everywhere, currently, around the world.
12:38 And last question, maybe before we leave, salam san paligre.
12:41 Are you preparing something new for us?
12:44 Is there an idea that is emerging, maybe?
12:47 Yes, ideas.
12:50 There are a lot of ideas.
12:54 I don't want to sell the seed because, as I said, I come from Burkina Faso.
13:01 And I was particularly marked by this man called Thomas Sankara, the president of Burkina
13:09 Faso, who was assassinated.
13:11 I know that there are parallel projects like that.
13:15 I think that Hicham Ayoub, who is a Moroccan filmmaker, has a project to tell the story
13:23 of Sankara, even here.
13:25 But I think it's all these points of view that we're telling this man, which will give
13:31 a certain extent to everything he did for Burkina Faso and everything he did for Africa.
13:38 So, I work secretly, and it's not a secret, on making a biopic about Thomas Sankara,
13:48 which is very important to me.
13:50 I think it's the project of my life.
13:53 I believe in it, I work slowly, and this is the opportunity to say it.
14:00 It's the project on President Thomas Sankara.
14:04 We'll be in touch, and we wish you a lot of courage and good luck.
14:09 Thank you, Salam Sanpaligre, for being with us.
14:12 Thank you, and thank you again for inviting me to talk about the film "The Taxi, the Cinema and Me".
14:20 Thank you.
14:21 Thank you. Have a good day.
14:28 After talking about cinema with Salam Sanpaligre for "The Taxi, the Cinema and Me",
14:34 we focus on Samuel Fosso, one of the most famous photographers of our continent
14:39 after a childhood marked by war.
14:41 Samuel Fosso opens a photography studio in Bangui, in the Central African Republic,
14:46 and gradually makes self-portraits on the fall of film.
14:50 His signature is already in the air.
14:52 Samuel Fosso plays a bit of Western clichés on the representation of Africa and its history.
14:57 He is one of the pioneers, a true avant-garde artist, well before the era of selfie.
15:02 Samuel Fosso is one of the greatest representatives of self-portrait,
15:06 which he radicalizes, pushes to the extreme, in order to denounce the transgressions of society
15:10 and above all to promote an Africa that has crossed its colonial past.
15:14 Samuel Fosso uses the body, the clothing, as a critical tool
15:17 to deconstruct social or even identity stereotypes.
15:21 And we've been listening to these two since the beginning.
15:25 In all of Africa, we started to have photography on commercial photos.
15:33 So I had my studio, which was created on September 14, 1995.
15:42 After learning photography, I did not study photography in Africa,
15:48 but I learned at a studio photographer.
15:53 After that, I opened my studio.
15:56 My studio is for people who come for all the ceremonies, weddings,
16:05 and I do the reportage.
16:10 But in the studio, normally, people come in the evening,
16:14 those who want to take a portrait, they come in the evening.
16:18 And those who want to take a picture of their baby, they come too.
16:22 Often in the evening.
16:24 And from there, when I take the photo, I finish it.
16:28 I can't do it because at that time, it was not very easy to do.
16:33 It's digital.
16:34 But before, you had to buy film, roll of film.
16:40 I had a camera that took film of 6x6.
16:47 6x6 is a little square, so it's 12 poses normally.
16:52 Sometimes I finish two or three rolls, if I can't finish the last one,
16:58 I start to take the photo myself.
17:01 And that's how I did it.
17:03 Samuel Fosso, but photography, the genre of self-portrait and performance.
17:06 His work now occupies a central place on the contemporary international artistic scene.
17:11 In fact, he creates over time a series of rather overwhelming avatars,
17:15 which also break all rules of representation.
17:18 Fosso will never stop reinventing himself in self-portraits,
17:21 which are precisely about the borders, whether social, geographical or identity.
17:26 Beyond a classic practice of self-portrait,
17:28 Samuel Fosso embodies multiple characters,
17:31 as a film actor could do, to better question the codes of representation.
17:36 By a singular work that combines photography and performance,
17:39 Samuel Fosso is part of a major international line of artists,
17:42 including the American photographer Cindy Sherman,
17:46 or the Japanese photographer Yasumasa Morimura.
17:49 Let's listen to Samuel Fosso.
17:51 When I embody a character, for example Martin Luther King,
17:58 I try to first comfort myself,
18:03 to try to make the minimum of resemblance.
18:11 I have to think about this by myself.
18:17 I am no longer in my mind, I am in the mind of my subject.
18:25 So my mind is immersed in him.
18:28 And when I immerse myself in him, I feel like I resemble him.
18:33 I have just found what I was looking for in him.
18:38 And now I am expressing it, because I am the one who is expressing my photo.
18:42 I express it, I look at it, and it's okay, it's correct, compared to what I see.
18:48 From there, my mind returns to myself.
18:52 In this process, I often say,
18:54 the photo I embody is me, but it's not me,
18:59 because it's not my story, it's the story of others I tell.
19:03 I immerse myself in the mind of this subject.
19:08 And when I finish, I take my mind out of it.
19:14 That's how I think about each person I want to embody.
19:23 Samuel Fosso is seen as one of the masters of the self-portrait,
19:27 juggling between several serious tones,
19:29 when he embodies Pan-African heroes in his series African Spirit,
19:32 or satirical, or even burlesque.
19:34 In a way, Samuel Fosso tells himself through a plethora of characters.
19:38 His work is constantly moving, free and versatile.
19:41 It puts down all the identity rules,
19:43 in a quest for self-representation, constantly renewing.
19:47 And that's the secret of Samuel Fosso.
19:49 In fact, as everyone knows,
19:54 the Mini-Connection is a prehistoric museum,
20:01 which tells the story of black people and Africans.
20:06 It was well placed.
20:09 It's very important for me to be at the Mini-Connection.
20:14 It's the most important way to better share my ideas.
20:21 My ideas about African Spirit.
20:26 It was well placed to better understand.
20:29 If we tell these stories,
20:31 it will be well spread and understood by black people,
20:38 Americans and Africans.
20:40 In fact, it's very important.
20:42 There's nothing else to say about Martin Luther King.
20:47 The story has already happened.
20:49 It's very important to put it in the museum,
20:52 to reactivate black people,
20:58 to better understand what Martin Luther King did.
21:03 I had the opportunity to be an artist,
21:06 and I participate in the contribution of our black brothers,
21:11 by building African and black American art,
21:15 and telling our story.
21:17 It's very simple.
21:19 I would like to tell my black American brothers,
21:24 that we are always together.
21:26 After talking to Samuel Fosso,
21:36 we will talk about cinema and focus on the sea of lies
21:40 by Moroccan director Asma El Moudir,
21:42 who won the award for the staging of the section
21:45 "A look at Cannes" in the last edition of the documentary
21:49 in which she tells the story of her family
21:52 through figurines made by her own father.
21:55 The director reconstructs a story step by step,
21:58 the one with a big ax and all the others.
22:01 Her, her family's.
22:02 A personal and cinematographic adventure
22:04 that started one day during a move
22:07 when Asma El Moudir falls on an old forgotten glass photo.
22:11 Let's watch the trailer.
22:14 They took me away.
22:16 They took me away.
22:19 What do I do?
22:24 You are a journalist.
22:26 I'm a director.
22:28 You are a journalist.
22:29 When was this?
22:32 That day was dangerous.
22:34 That day, I couldn't leave.
22:37 The graves are closed.
22:42 The truths are hidden.
22:44 I was a body in the hands of a man.
22:47 At the same time,
22:49 Fatima came to me with the body.
22:52 I was only a photo in the white and black.
22:56 I'm going to tell you this.
22:59 I'm going to tell you this.
23:00 I'm going to tell you this.
23:01 I'm going to tell you this.
23:07 It was a young man
23:10 who came back from the war.
23:13 It was a young man.
23:15 Who was it that you entered?
23:17 Me.
23:18 Who was it?
23:19 Me.
23:20 You?
23:21 This is what I'm going to tell you.
23:34 The truth is that I'm a journalist.
23:38 Mother of all lies,
23:40 Asma El Moudir,
23:41 who tells her story,
23:42 the story of her country.
23:43 She recreates her childhood,
23:44 but she also updates the unspoken,
23:47 the wounds, the traumas.
23:48 Asma El Moudir leaves a microcosm,
23:50 her neighborhood of Casablanca,
23:52 where her family lives,
23:53 and which experienced horror
23:55 on June 1st, 1981.
23:56 Asma El Moudir reads the languages,
23:58 the silence, or rather the silences
24:00 around this story.
24:01 Little by little, she reconstitutes the pieces,
24:03 the memories, like a scattered puzzle
24:05 that we reconstruct throughout the documentary.
24:08 She also explores the memory of everyone,
24:10 trying to understand why
24:12 some lies were told to her.
24:14 And since it's about reconstituting past events,
24:17 where the visual archive doesn't exist,
24:19 the filmmaker decides to stage
24:20 miniatures, figurines made by her father,
24:23 and which represent her family and her neighborhood.
24:26 According to the critics,
24:27 Mother of all Lies is a balanced, sober film,
24:29 with a precise and sophisticated narration.
24:32 It reveals secrets to us,
24:33 which are created as we go along,
24:35 and we understand the story of a family
24:37 in the story of a country,
24:38 with the Mother of all Lies,
24:40 which the director took 10 years to conceive.
24:42 Asma El Moudir confirms her cinematographic gaze
24:45 and enters the courtyard of the Grands,
24:47 with the price of the staging,
24:49 which was awarded to her
24:50 at the Cannes Film Festival,
24:51 in the "A Certain Look" section.
24:53 And before we leave in the African culture,
25:01 we'll talk about this exhibition,
25:03 from the Maricler Messouma Sejouin.
25:06 Malambien presents her new project,
25:08 designed for the Tokyo Palace in Paris.
25:11 The being, the other, and the other,
25:12 are drawn from different cultures,
25:14 which make up their identity,
25:15 of Guadeloupe and Ivorian origin.
25:17 The artist invites to the activities,
25:19 and Manuel, in his childhood,
25:20 with his mother and his grandmother,
25:22 each of his works combines elements
25:24 from these different universes,
25:26 which she explores.
25:27 The symbols, we ask people.
25:29 We listen to Maricler Messouma Malambien.
25:32 I try to modulate the different pieces,
25:37 the different forms that make up the global piece,
25:41 so that the work is ephemeral
25:46 in its global form,
25:47 and changes at each exhibition.
25:49 These are pieces that can overlap,
25:53 cross, stack.
25:56 I try to create a dialogue with the viewer.
26:00 The viewer participates in the work,
26:07 because he reads the poem,
26:10 which is engraved on each piece of copper,
26:13 which I integrate into the sculpture.
26:15 It creates a kind of dance
26:17 with the viewer and the sculpture.
26:24 Maricler Messouma Malambien also says,
26:26 "I try to question the clothing.
26:29 In some contexts, the sponge is the kitak,
26:31 which has a story in it.
26:32 It is this story that I mix with my story,
26:35 with other historical elements and other stories."
26:37 This is what the artist says.
26:39 It is a very complex work,
26:42 which is at the same time very organic
26:43 and very human-related.
26:44 It is something that could look like a kind of cosmos.
26:48 There is also a very constructed side.
26:50 It must be said that we have the impression
26:51 that these are kind of memory cards,
26:53 where a story is fused.
26:57 If you want to admire it,
26:59 it is from the Sejouin at the Palais de Tokyo in Paris
27:03 that we will be able to see Maricler Messouma,
27:05 who will present his new project,
27:08 conceived from his ideas,
27:11 which he has always promoted.
27:13 This is how this new sculpture
27:15 in the heart of Africa ends.
27:17 Thank you for being with us.
27:18 We'll see you next week.
27:20 No doubt!
27:21 [music]
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