May 12 to Jun 2, 2022 · Trailer
...we tune into diverse and interconnected notions of freedom pertinent to Africa, the diaspora, and the world at large...
Full Statement
On the eve of her mother’s funeral and on the night before his wedding day, both Muriel and Sam try to find comfort in the face of monumental changes, even if that comfort only lasts "for the night."
Ousmane, a 7-year-old child who begs in the streets, decides to write a letter to Santa Claus.
Lezare is a revealing and touching story about a homeless boy in a small village in southern Ethiopia, using beautiful visuals to deliver a powerful message about global warming and shortsightedness.
By answering an 18-point questionnaire, one hears about the Africa that sparks these people’s memories and personal perspectives.
At the age of 25, the artist-caricaturist BB finds himself faced with an impossible choice. Son of the inflexible imam Karamo, the guardian of his village's ancestral traditions, BB is chosen to be his father's worthy successor.
Selam is determined to change her family’s fate through her passion for running. An international race offers her a chance to achieve her dream.
In a cotton-farming village in Sudan, 15-year-old Nafisa has a crush on Babiker, but her parents have arranged her marriage to Nadir, a young Sudanese businessman living abroad.
When an African Pentecostal pastor in London undergoes a life-changing event, she questions everything she believes in.
A meditation on migration, loss of language, and the transcendence of reimagined forms of communication. Through her relationship with her grandmothers, filmmaker Abul Ajak explores how cultural identities are not fixed, but always in transition.
Shot in Dakar with the participation of leading Senegalese musicians, poets, and graffiti artists, ALGO-RHYTHM probes the rise in the algorithmic management of daily life and the insidious threats it poses to human rights and agency.
Khanya and Sandiswa’s father leaves them in his car outside the local horse racing tracks under strict instructions to stay put. Khanya gets her period and decides to enter the arena. When she is confronted by her father, the true confines of their delicate relationship come to light.
TGV is an express bus service between Dakar, Senegal, and Conakry, Guinea, operated by the enterprising Rambo and his assistant, Dembo. Before setting off, Rambo and his passengers are warned of the danger that lies ahead on their route.
Selam is determined to change her family’s fate through her passion for running. An international race offers her a chance to achieve her dream.
Destiny is the key to belief systems of the Merina people, but Kapila, the crippled hero, embarks on a journey which ultimately leads him to embrace a future guided by love and imagination.
Every evening in a popular area of the city of Bobo-Dioulasso in Burkina Faso, Ms. Coda welcomes the children of sex workers into her home. The young women then stroll through the "Black," a lively alley in the city center, until daybreak when they come to pick up their babies.
Honoré and Grégoire are preparing for their mother’s funeral. They are faced with the swarm of expenses associated with funerals in Porto Novo, Benin. The “nerve of war” is the nerve of their preparation.
Moving fluidly between Denmark, Nigeria, Canada, and the USA, this film gently unfolds as a poetic and psychologically complex exploration of the meeting between western and African concepts of love, relationships, and family.
A rare, homegrown study on the life of the late Burkinabè president and revolutionary, Thomas Sankara, the Human, hands surviving witnesses of the Sankara era the microphone, allowing them to reveal what they have in the depths of their conscience without censorship.
In 1986, under the leadership of President Thomas Sankara, 600 orphans and rural children from Burkina Faso were sent to Cuba with the mission of learning a trade in order to come back and develop their country. Their mission was deflected by the assassination of Sankara in 1987. This documentary mixes recounted memories with archival imagery, giving us a glimpse into the reminiscences of their revolutionary youth.
With the first continental gold record in 1980, prolific singer, Laba Sosseh, became an emblematic figure of Afro-Cuban music in Africa. His career spanned more than 45 years, until his death in 2007. This documentary takes us on a journey ten years later, tracing his ever-present influence.
The first Black woman president of the United States announces that African Americans will finally receive reparations. A Nigerian-American family grapples with what this means for them, unearthing latent tensions along the way.
Kasongo (Im)Materiel explores the forgotten history of the Swahili-Arab in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Their trajectory from oppressors to oppressed, along with the local adoption of their culture and language, mirrors the tensions and ambivalence of history and heritage.
Five Black lawyers discover the contradictions of studying in an institution that idealistically represents "justice" for all.
From the Cave's Mouth is a short animated film centered on a Khoi-san family who leave their ancestral home in search of a missing family member. Over the course of thousands of years, we watch as life comes and goes until one day, the home is rediscovered by a very distant modern family member.
Since the late 1980s, many Senegalese dancers have migrated to Europe in hopes of finding a better life. Through words and movement, Hélène recounts how she overcame the hardships of migration, built her fighter mentality, and progressed in her career—sharing her irrepressible need to dance.
At the southern edge of the Sahara desert stands The House of Migrants, a safe haven for those on their way to Europe, or those returning home. Here they come to terms with their individual migration stories. How does one feel, or what does one need, when their dreams have been buried in the sand, or when they are waiting to be lived?
In this mockumentary-style, politically-incorrect satire, Jean-Pascal Zadi organizes a protest while contemplating racial discrimination and his identity as a Black man in France.
To inspire striking workers, a griot (oral historian) tells of a legendary prince, Dieri Dior Ndella, who sacrificed his life during colonialism, and Koura Thiaw, an entertainer who took up the cause of oppressed domestics in the 1940s, with both becoming heroes to their people.
Freda lives with her family in a popular neighborhood in Port-au-Prince. Faced with precarious living conditions and the rise of violence in Haiti, each of them wonders whether to stay or leave. Freda, however, is determined to believe in the future of her country.
Denge, a young freedom fighter, meets Yasmin, an Indian-Zanzibari woman, in the middle of the night as she is on her way to be married. Passion and revolution ensue in this coming-of-age political love story set in the final years of British colonial Zanzibar.
Mbissine Thérèse Diop played the starring role in Ousmane Sembène’s landmark first feature, 1966’s Black Girl (La Noire de…). Today, she looks back on her experience as a Black actress in the 1960s.
A single woman’s feelings of loneliness begin to stir when an eccentric African couple moves in next door to her.
An older undocumented migrant is summarily dismissed from her housekeeping position. Cast into desperate uncertainty, she roams the city in despair.
Waldo and Shey are in love. Waldo, who lives in Berlin, travels to Lisbon to meet Shey. Their encounter will test the emotional strength of their bond and expose uncertainties about their Afro-Portuguese cultural and historical identities.
Nkem and her brother are struggling through the anniversary of their father’s death, when an encounter forces them to confront their identity in America.
In a distant future, an artificial-intelligence entity inaugurated as the world’s first AI leader finds that important worldviews are missing from her database, including stories of the historically marginalized and oppressed.
This short film is the beginning of a larger project documenting Baba Mpho Shanto, AKA Menes De Griot. A culture keeper of our time, Baba Mpho is actively preserving African traditions in the global community.
Salewa must return home for her mother’s funeral, to Lagos, a place where she once had to hide herself. At the funeral, she runs into an important person from her past, and is forced to go in search of her own peace.
In Keur Massar, Senegal, following annual flooding, residents and community organizers show the effects on their lives and homes of poor infrastructure and the increasing impact of climate change. This short film shows how the residents live with and through the flooding, and explores the causes of and possible solutions to this crisis.
Residents of Grand Dakar renting apartments in big, crowded buildings elect to use public water taps for their everyday needs rather than the city’s system. This short film explores the economic reasons behind their decision, and the challenges posed by municipal water pricing to the city’s residents.
In Banjul, a group of activists and members of the youth council speak about the need for decentralization of water management in the city and the country at large. Mayor Roheyatou Lowe focuses on the importance of women as primary water users, and invites the aid of partners interested in working on water in Banjul.
In Chefchaouen, Morocco, a group of students learn about water resource management while walking around their city. Mayor Mohamed Sefiani leads us through Chefchaouen’s conservation efforts for its drought-prone region, and explains what could be done to improve water access in the city.
Secretary-General of the United Cities and Local Governments - Africa, Jean-Pierre Elong Mbassi opens a conversation on the role of African mayors in leading local climate action and water security.
Aziza Akhmouch describes the role of African mayors in ensuring water security and how film can raise the voices of underrepresented voices in climate change.
Twelve-year-old Houlaye lives in Niger, and travels several kilometers each day to fetch water. Her village’s efforts to construct a well bring the promise of a new life for people who have literally been walking on water since birth.
A woman asleep begins to dream. It is a dream that distorts her perception of time and space in relation to her mundane daily tasks—an illusion that evokes a surreal experience of the self.
Oliver North’s Mier covers two days in the lives of Oupa, a San hunter/gatherer who lives in the desert, and Boetie, a ‘colored’ boy from a nearby settlement to which his people were relocated. Over the course of the story, we find out that they are hunting on this land illegally and that they have more in common than either would suspect.
Based on true events, this film recounts a 2012 massacre in which a group of South African mine workers went on a wage-increase strike, leading to a national tragedy in which 34 miners were brutally killed by the police.
Botlhale, who’s mentally ill, makes new friends and finds love when he’s institutionalized. The comrades plan an escape to Chicken Heart, a fast-food joint, where they’ll live out their fantasies of being high-society people. But their outing collides with the shutting down of their home, forcing the friends to confront tragedy and death head-on.
In this mockumentary-style, politically-incorrect satire, Jean-Pascal Zadi organizes a protest while contemplating racial discrimination and his identity as a Black man in France.
The Sun Rises in The East chronicles the birth, rise, and legacy of The East, a pan-African cultural organization founded in 1969 by teens and young adults in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn. Featuring interviews with leaders of The East, historians, and people who grew up in the organization as children, Tayo Giwa’s documentary delivers an exhilarating and compelling vision for today’s movement for racial justice, showing just how much is possible.
John Ogunmuyiwa’s vibrant short is an ode to the mundanity and madness of the high street, told through the window of an African hair salon in London.
Charles Castella captures filmmaker Abderrahmane Sissako as he takes up an unexpected artistic challenge: to stage Le Vol du boli (The Flight of the Boli), an opera based on the history of Africa, at the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris.
A meek young boy, Manzini, is attacked by three bullies on his way home from school in an incident that almost costs him his life. His grandmother narrates a profound tale of resilience, chronicling the coming of age of a great warrior and king, Shaka Zulu, to inspire Manzini through the strength of his lineage.
Ayaanle is a 21-year-old Somali man living in Nairobi, with dreams of becoming a world-famous actor. His life is turned upside down through a series of unlikely and adverse events that force him to defy the odds for his survival.
Denge, a young freedom fighter, meets Yasmin, an Indian-Zanzibari woman, in the middle of the night as she is on her way to be married. Passion and revolution ensue in this coming-of-age political love story set in the final years of British colonial Zanzibar.
Mbissine Thérèse Diop played the starring role in Ousmane Sembène’s landmark first feature, 1966’s Black Girl (La Noire de…). Today, she looks back on her experience as a Black actress in the 1960s.
Freda lives with her family in a popular neighborhood in Port-au-Prince. Faced with precarious living conditions and the rise of violence in Haiti, each of them wonders whether to stay or leave. Freda, however, is determined to believe in the future of her country.
Shot in Belgium and the DRC, Juwaa is a subtly powerful drama offering African characters rarely seen on screens. Years after a traumatic night, a son and a mother reconcile and slowly peel away the layers of their complex relationship.
The Sun Rises in The East chronicles the birth, rise, and legacy of The East, a pan-African cultural organization founded in 1969 by teens and young adults in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn. Featuring interviews with leaders of The East, historians, and people who grew up in the organization as children, Tayo Giwa’s documentary delivers an exhilarating and compelling vision for today’s movement for racial justice, showing just how much is possible.
John Ogunmuyiwa’s vibrant short is an ode to the mundanity and madness of the high street, told through the window of an African hair salon in London.
In a time of misfortune, Guled and his family have to push themselves to the limits in order to find the strength to reunite their family.
Juju Stories explores juju in contemporary Lagos through three stories about possession, love potions, and love and friendship turned to obsession.
After the complicated birth of her first child, Maria, Derin becomes withdrawn from family life, unable to engage in the celebrations around her newborn. Her bewildered mother-in-law insists that she is not a good enough parent, while her increasingly worried husband Afolabi watches from the sidelines as she becomes a shadow of herself.
The close relationship between twin sisters is shattered irrevocably when one insists on upholding tradition through the circumcision of her daughter.
A magical-realist film set in London, Born Again follows Nwa, a British-Nigerian woman tormented by her inability to have children. However, a transformative baptism leads her on a journey of healing and rebirth.
Ayanda’s double life comes crashing down around her when a surprise visit from her mom upsets the carefully built closet she hides in. Torn between traditional family expectations and career aspirations, Ayanda tears her relationship apart. But somewhere in the heart of it all, acceptance is found.
Wrestling with the loss of her mother, a young girl questions her faith when she is asked to pray for her grandmother’s healing.
“The K-Z” is the slang term for a leisure activity that the young boxer Moussa views with suspicion. But a friend advises him to give it a try in order to attract the attention of the beautiful Sanaa.
Described as a trans woman's journey of love, loss, and redemption through the seasons, Winter Insect, Summer Flower uses a circular narrative to explore the ever-evolving body.
Set in a not-so-distant future Lagos, Remi, an EFCC (Economic and Financial Crimes Commission) officer, investigates Ijapa's mysterious presidential campaign.
This memory trip of juvenile sentiments recalls the filmmaker's time at a colonial legacy boarding school. To revisit those times, the director, Neema recreates her memories using collage. She lays down the absurd, the silly, and the sometimes unforgivable, interrogating it with her present self.
In this experimental short, nonbinary visual artist, Ele, contemplates their evolving relationship with darkness.
A musical drama about the illegal trafficking of women, 10 Songs for Charity follows Nigerian sisters Charity and Happy as they endure the day-to-day hardships of being illegal sex workers in Belgium.
Young Aya lives with her mother on the island of Lahou. Joyful and carefree, she loves picking coconuts and sleeping in the sand. As waves begin to threaten her home, Aya makes a decision—the sea level may rise, but she won’t leave her island.
When Women Speak shot entirely in Ghana, traces a cohort of 16 women who came of age during the 1960s and 1970s and catalogs their experiences, told in their own words, as Ghana passed through periods of single-party, military, and multi-party rule.
In this comedy of errors, an old, experienced truck driver, Abu Saddam, who's been out of the business for some time, takes a transportation job that ends up getting out of control.
In a cotton-farming village in Sudan, 15-year-old Nafisa has a crush on Babiker, but her parents have arranged her marriage to Nadir, a young Sudanese businessman living abroad.
When an African Pentecostal pastor in London undergoes a life-changing event, she questions everything she believes in.
A meditation on migration, loss of language, and the transcendence of reimagined forms of communication. Through her relationship with her grandmothers, filmmaker Abul Ajak explores how cultural identities are not fixed, but always in transition.
Shot in Dakar with the participation of leading Senegalese musicians, poets, and graffiti artists, ALGO-RHYTHM probes the rise in the algorithmic management of daily life and the insidious threats it poses to human rights and agency.
Khanya and Sandiswa’s father leaves them in his car outside the local horse racing tracks under strict instructions to stay put. Khanya gets her period and decides to enter the arena. When she is confronted by her father, the true confines of their delicate relationship come to light.
Three mercenaries on an escape mission to Dakar, Senegal are forced into hiding along the coast. When the past catches up to one of them, his decisions have devastating consequences.
A touching investigation of innocent love between children in Senegal set against the background of a traditional class system.
In Makoko, the largest slum on water in Nigeria, Mrs. F. sets out to unite women by staging a play called Hear Word, an empowerment project based on true stories.
Hot Irons offers an inside glimpse at Motor City hair salons that turn the tresses of their African-American clientele into remarkable works of art.
About Braids is a magical encounter between a mysterious young woman and a gifted African hair-braider who is asked to recreate a completely unconventional style.
An extra-marital affair leads to Hortense’s separation from her very traditional African husband, who is in for a ride as he learns about her love affair, his eldest son’s secret love life, and the responsibilities of single parenthood.
TGV is an express bus service between Dakar, Senegal, and Conakry, Guinea, operated by the enterprising Rambo and his assistant, Dembo. Before setting off, Rambo and his passengers are warned of the danger that lies ahead on their route.
Malian director Hawa Aliou N'Diaye believes that she is possessed by a jinn. In this documentary, she interviews other women who share her experience.
Kongo Congo' story, and the film’s narrative, follow invisible trajectories intertwined with Congolese history and Belgium’s ghosts.
In this comedy of errors featuring some of Nigeria's finest entertainers, a bus driver loses some psychiatric patients on the way to a federal hospital, and decides to substitute them with unsuspecting sane commuters.
An extra-marital affair leads to Hortense’s separation from her very traditional African husband, who is in for a ride as he learns about her love affair, his eldest son’s secret love life, and the responsibilities of single parenthood.
Follow Dumisani's epic journey to find his 51 siblings and come to terms with the loss of his father as a child.
Lincoln Center Atrium:
May 11, 2022
Ticket info
Film at Lincoln Center:
May 12, 2022
to May 17, 2022
Ticket info
Maysles Cinema:
May 19, 2022
to May 22, 2022
Ticket info
Brooklyn Academy of Music:
May 27, 2022
to June 2, 2022
Ticket info
Digital Art Exhibition: freedom is a durational practice at Film at Lincoln Center Amphitheater, New York
Cinema of Liberation: From Inception and Execution to Exhibition with Haile Gerima at Film at Lincoln Center Amphitheater, New York