Directing
Gwoka drums have resonated in Guadeloupe since the arrival of the first enslaved people. Rooted in the island's rural history and long marginalized, this tradition—encompassing vocals, music, and dance—symbolizes the local population's reclamation of its profound identity. For the first time, a documentary film captures the social and historical dynamics of Gwoka; moving from one "léwoz" gathering to the next and through various encounters, it reveals the art form's power and richness.
Rumba—the musical memory of African peoples—permeates the lives of the people of Zaire and the Congo along the banks of the Congo River, where, from bars to dance halls and from sound systems to live orchestras, everyone comes to defy the letdown of tomorrow with a touch of humor and a beer.
Cinés d'Afrique, a documentary structured like a magazine program, aims to provide an overview of the state of African cinema by exploring seven topics representative of its current realities. Collectively, these subjects offer a ground-level panorama—a perspective grounded in actual practice—of the directions African cinema is currently taking. The content of Cinés d'Afrique is driven by a dual purpose: to describe the practices and experiences that illustrate the unique nature of African cinema, and to highlight the viewpoints and critical reflections that this cinema generates about itself.
When four jazz musicians—trumpeter Serge Adam, pianist Benoît Delbecq, bassist Francky Mwele, and drummer Emile Biayenda—prepare for an African tour with the aim of engaging in dialogue with the musicians they meet along the way, certain clichés prove hard to shake. The jazzmen themselves are well aware of this; after all, isn't their very starting point a desire to avoid them? Musical curiosity must be reciprocal, and, after all, jazz is surely the territory that—even if not strictly shared—serves as an initial "no man's land" for an encounter. Beyond that lies the adventure...
