Burkina Faso and France / 1994 / 25mins / Drama / Dioula

An African fairy tale about a young boy who is very different: an albino, Khalifa has been abandoned by his parents, but is much loved by a little girl named Mina, his adoptive mother Soussou, and the old cow who is his nanny. When rustlers steal his cow, Khalifa disappears in pursuit, and in his absence, an old legend takes hold of the community’s collective imagination. The albino boy has been transformed into a spirit bent on punishing the kids in the district. If Khalifa reappears, will the flesh-and-blood child be able to exorcise the specter of a bad-tempered ghost?

Issa Traoré de Brahima

Issa Traoré de Brahima was born in 1962 in Abidjan, Ivory Coast. He enrolled at the African Institute of Cinematic Studies in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, where he obtained a cinematographic creation degree in 1985, and thereafter he went to Paris to obtain his university diploma. Between 1986 and 1991 he was an assistant on several short films, after which he was co-director on Bilakoro and the director of Gombélé. After training himself in script writing he wrote several screenplays. He has also been assistant director on several films, including Dani Kouyaté’s Keïta! L’Héritage du Griot, J. Mrozowski’s La Revanche de Lucie, and Issaka Konaté’s Souko, le cinematographe en carton. His 2001 feature film, Siraba, la grande voie, took home two awards at the 2001 Ouagadougou Panafrican Film and Television Festival (FESPACO). Learn More