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00:03For the final panel of the day on Rwandan drama Benemana, the film has made history on two counts.
00:11It became the first film by a Rwandan director to be selected for official selection at the Cannes Film Festival
00:16last May,
00:17where it premiered in Uncertain Regards and won the Camerado for Best First Film.
00:22And then on Thursday, it was announced as Rwanda's first ever entry to the Best International Feature Film category at
00:28the Academy Awards.
00:30That's amazing.
00:31Benemana is set in 2012, some 18 years after the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi at the hands of the
00:37Hutus.
00:38It explores the human side of the reconciliation process through the microcosm of a village where survivors and perpetrators live
00:46side by side.
00:49At the heart of the story is Venaranda, a Tutsi woman who seeks to foster reconciliation for the good of
00:56the future of Rwanda
00:56until a life-changing family event throws up old wounds from the past.
01:01For this conversation, it gives me great pleasure to welcome to the stage the film's director, Marie-Clementine de Zajambeau.
01:16I think we're sort of central.
01:18And before we start the conversation, we're going to watch a clip setting the scene.
01:25We're going to watch a clip setting the scene.
01:41We're going to watch a clip here.
01:45We're going to watch a clip.
01:50Thank you very much.
02:35So just to open the conversation, can you explain what is happening in that scene?
02:40What is it?
02:42It seems like a courtroom scene or something.
02:43Yes, this is the Gachacha court.
02:47They were a traditional court that was set in the aftermath of the genocide against the Tutsis in Rwanda.
02:53So there were so many prisoners in prison.
02:59And also, there were also people on the hills who wanted to know the truth.
03:03This was a space for me when I was doing the research.
03:09I find it to be a place of transmission.
03:12I come from this traditional culture that everything is transmitted through words, through poetry.
03:19And this was the time where the past came to impose itself in the present time, where people had to
03:27say what they did, the decision they took in the 1994 genocide, and the truth was being spoken here.
03:35But beyond the modern justice, they were looking for peace, and they were saying it's peace beyond justice.
03:46There were some truths that were very hard to understand or to find words to explain it in that time.
03:55And so it's a way, there were politics that were trying to invent itself.
04:03They were looking the way they can live together in this zone, in the aftermath of the genocide.
04:09And this was one of the biggest events and most complicated times in the history of Rwanda.
04:17I mean, it's very different from, say, the Nuremberg trials, which were about punishment.
04:22And this is about reconciliation, so you have the perpetrators and the survivors together.
04:27So it's very tricky.
04:29And then there we see, as I said, we see Veneranda, who is this woman who's, like, devoted her life
04:35to helping survivors and believes that they can be reconciliation.
04:38But then we discover, actually, internally, it's a battle for her as well.
04:43And then Suzanne, her sister, who actually witnessed violence firsthand, and she wants vengeance.
04:50But just to go back very briefly, back to the beginning of your career, I read that you were going
04:54to go into electronics.
04:55And I was just wondering, how did you end up then making film?
04:59So I just find myself into films.
05:02My background was in mathematics and physics.
05:04And by the time I was waiting to go to university to do electronics and telecommunication, there were a group
05:13of young people, most of the time of my age.
05:17We went to the primary school together.
05:19They have worked on a film that was made by Isaac Lichung.
05:26He's a filmmaker from Korea, U.S., American-Korean filmmaker.
05:32And the film was also on the aftermath of the genocide.
05:35The film was in Cannes in 27.
05:38And so after they worked on that film, he gave them equipment.
05:43So they were doing short films.
05:45And in that time, there were a call for Tribeca Film Institute.
05:50They wanted short stories on resilience.
05:53So it was a group of only boys.
05:58So they told me, you know, you like to tell stories, you can write a story.
06:02So at that time, I wrote a story about resilience.
06:05It was also about the Gachacha Court.
06:07They were that layer.
06:08I was very interested.
06:10I think it was something within me to want to know what happened in my community and how people responded.
06:19So we had many things.
06:21We were surrounded with a lot of taboo when we grow up.
06:25There were a lot of sirens between our generation and the generation of our parents.
06:29I have never been to this Gachacha Court.
06:32So there was something inside me maybe that wanted to know, to understand, to, you know, what is going on
06:40after the 1994 genocide.
06:42And at that time, I write about the story of resilience.
06:47It was a short film, and, you know, they sent Isaac Richard and the teachers all the basics, really looking
06:54into the camera, writing a script.
06:57And the short film went in many festivals also.
07:00So when I started to go to festivals, meeting other filmmakers, sitting in rooms when they were talking about politics,
07:11literature, as my background was in mathematics.
07:13So it was very fascinating for me.
07:16And most of the time, I get to watch films on Africa, history, culture, films that I have never watched
07:27when I was growing up.
07:28So I think that's what made me stay.
07:31And then there were a series of events that happened during my career, meeting good filmmakers and learning while I'm
07:41working.
07:41And I find myself doing a lot of researches for international films.
07:46And it's opened more doors for me to understand the Rwandan community.
07:51I mean, just some of your credits in that period.
07:53So you had the short film, Le Lietze.
07:57That was about a girl whose parents had been killed in the genocide, I think.
08:02Is that correct?
08:02Yes, that's correct.
08:03And then another one, a place for myself about a girl who was suffering from a skin condition and was
08:08being ostracized at home.
08:09And then you worked on why we hate and faces we lost.
08:12Why did you then decide that you wanted to embark on the process of a feature?
08:17And did you think documentary, fiction, how did you arrive at that?
08:20What kind of research did you do?
08:22Actually, when I started working on this future film, it was 2013 after the first short film.
08:30So all of these films came while I already have this film, I think, in the belly of my destiny.
08:39But still, it was a film that was still trying to find expression in me.
08:44I needed time to understand, to feel, to read, to hear.
08:49Because there's a lot of, it's Rwandan community, it's very reserved.
08:53You need to really have a time to find your way into all these dimensions of expression, body language, knowing
09:01when the memory comes.
09:03All of those things I needed to learn it myself and the reason why I wanted to do this film,
09:10I think I said it, it was going back to the source.
09:14You know, there's a point in time where in every generation we need to understand what happened, the historical circumstance
09:25of where we came from, what happened, what people decided to do in their time within their own means to
09:32be able to continue.
09:34So this film, as it was evolving, and I saw this Kachacha quote as a love letter from our parents'
09:42generation to us, as the genocide against the Tutsis happened, they had to find a way within their own means
09:50to give justice.
09:52And it was more, it wasn't that perfect as people can say or can think, it was hard, it was
09:59a space where to get into this place you have to be courage enough to face your past, you have
10:06to have the strength to stand in front of the face who represents all the problems, all the issues you
10:15have.
10:18So navigating through this project and other people's projects, it was all leading me to finding myself, to finding an
10:26expression to be able to tell this story.
10:30It's really, I wanted to be more authentic to the history, and I also wanted to not fall into comparison
10:38or judgment, judging the people, the generation that came before us, what they did.
10:46And I didn't really want to fall into also a stereotype of the victim and the perpetrators.
10:52And as all of this was turning around, making peace, being able to create a future, either for them and
11:04either for us, the next generation, that is something I really wanted to bring on the screen, to talk about
11:10this, to put a mirror to my community, but not really destroying them, because it has been destroyed already.
11:18And the casting, you have got one or two professional actors, but a lot of them are amateur, where did
11:24you find them?
11:25How did you bring the people we see on screen into the project?
11:30Many of the women in the therapy room, I worked with them during my research.
11:36Actually, actually, they are the ones who opened the doors for me to enter into the womb of my community,
11:43if I can say, so they were in the room.
11:47And also, other actresses who are not professional, I was meeting them, or I was being introduced to them by
11:57friends, but the most important things I was looking into them is their faces,
12:04how they look, and also how they relate to the story, because that was very important for me, this is
12:11a very intimate film, and as much as I wanted the film to reflect the home ground,
12:17the way we express ourselves in all dimensions, the words, the body language, so I was looking to find those
12:27people, and most of the time it's the people I knew, or people I get connected to, through friends.
12:36So we don't see, obviously, that in the clip, but a lot of the story is set in therapy sessions,
12:43and discussions about what happened,
12:45and sometimes, for me, it's not overblown, but it's raw, the emotion on screen, and I was wondering how you
12:52managed that.
12:53Are they acting from a screenplay, or were you workshopping a bit, or is it spontaneous sometimes?
12:58And did you have people on set to help people, because it's a really traumatic story?
13:04Yeah, so it's, yeah, I love that the film looks like a million dollar, but it's not a million dollar.
13:12So the million dollar lies from the love, and the urge, and the will of the people who are working
13:20with me to tell the story.
13:23It's 32, it was 31 years after the genocide against the Tutsis, and it was also, I think, during the
13:31shooting, the breaking of silence.
13:33There were these, people gave themselves, because they wanted this to be, the story to be told.
13:40We didn't have therapists all around us, no, but most of the time, it was, the sisterhood that is in
13:49the film was behind the camera.
13:52There were the sisterhood, the brotherhood, the way many times the reality, the fiction was meeting the reality,
13:58because many, all of us, it's 100% made by Rwandan, all of us, we are connected to this story.
14:06I just want to squeeze in two questions.
14:09The setting, it's like a very rural setting, it's so lush and beautiful, and it's hard to believe these horrors
14:15had happened in this place.
14:17Can you just talk a little bit about that?
14:19So it was, for me, very important to bring on the screen the beauty of Rwanda, so besides the beauty
14:28that was surrounding Rwanda, the genocide happened.
14:32And then in the aftermath of the, and also during the genocide, this beauty was also, we were also part
14:41of the ecosystem.
14:44There were people who were saved because they were hiding before the tree, because they were hiding in the valley,
14:50because they just had to run up the hill.
14:53So there is always a connection between the environment, and also because we have so many things we share as
15:03Rwandis, the question of ethnics that actually in the Rwandan culture doesn't work,
15:08because all these ethnics, we share one language, one culture, everything is the same.
15:14So we met in somewhere in the mother tongue, and that's where we get to connect, so I was really
15:21looking on that beauty that link us, and to make it the centre of this story.
15:27And you kind of answered my last, my final question was that in the press notes, I mean, you were
15:31seven years old when the genocide took place.
15:34In the press notes, you're asked, which side did your family identify with?
15:40And you refused to answer that, and I was just, why, why won't you, why won't you put that out
15:46there?
15:46I actually answered that.
15:47You have just answered it again, but I want to ask you.
15:49I answered that, because, you know, I grew up in the aftermath of the 1994 genocide against Tustis, and one
15:57of the sacrifices, I think I call it a sacrifice,
16:00because this was to remove the ethnic identity from our identity card.
16:09And this was a sacrifice, because there are people who died because of this identity, and who needed to get
16:15reparation.
16:16And the fact that they decided to remove this, so that the next generation can share one identity, which is
16:24being Rwandan.
16:27And so, for me, I grew up in that Rwanda, so I didn't identify myself to any of those ethnics.
16:37No, my parents didn't tell me you are this, so you have to stand in this. So, yeah, that's why.
16:43Well, thank you very much. It's such a great film.
16:47Thank you so much.
16:48And I'm so happy to see you going into the Oscar race and the awards season race.
16:52So, all the best with it.
16:54Anyway, that's our last panel, so a big hand of applause.