Belgium and Cameroon / 2018 / 71mins / Documentary / French and Pidgin

Recruited by a Lebanese maid agency, Sabine leaves Cameroon and embarks for Lebanon. After many years of servitude, she escapes to Belgium, but her arrival there is complicated by the fact that she enters illegally, by way of Greece and Syria. She settles in Matonge, the African quarter, where she becomes the manager of the beauty salon Chez Jolie Coiffure. Here, patrons, many of them undocumented immigrants, are not only be made to feel beautiful but can also escape the daily difficulties and harsh realities of their lives.

Rosine Mbakam

Rosine Mfetgo Mbakam grew up in a traditional family in Cameroon. She chose cinema very early, training in Yaoundé after learning about the Italian NGO, COE (Centro Orientamento Educativo) where, beginning in 2000 she was introduced to image making, editing and production. While there, she collaborated on and directed several films. After a meeting with Mactar Sylla in 2003, she joined the team of STV (Spectrum Television) where she directed and edited several audiovisual programmes. In 2007, she left Cameroon and enrolled at INSAS in Brussels for a training course. In 2014, she founded with Geoffroy Cernaix, Tandor Productions and directed The Two Faces of a Bamileke Woman, her first creative documentary. Mbakam’s 2019 Chez Jolie Coiffure, a documentary capturing the day-to-day lives and concerns of immigrant West African women in a small hair salon in Brussels, screened at several festivals and won the Spirit of the Festival Prize at Light Film Festival 2019. Her 2021 documentary, Delphine's Prayers, is an intimate and powerful portrait of a Cameroonian immigrant living in Brussels. The film won the Young Audience Award at Cinema du Réel 2021 and the Grand Prize at IndieLisboa 2021. Learn More