See below for information on locations and distribution for these films.
Some "Mudjahadines," the women fighters during the war of Independence from the French (1954-1962), recall their own experiences: their hopes and their disillusion after the war, when the Government refused to recognize their role and contribution to the National Liberation Movement. A new generation of women tries to find a path between modern democracy and the fundamentalism of the Islamic faith.
"This film offers a rare insight into the key role Algerian women played in their country's liberation struggle from the French thirty years ago and their equally important place in today's politics. Produced for Channel Four television, this high-quality documentary uses a combination of interviews and archival footage to ponder the thirty years of single party rule, the rise of Islam and increasing political violence. It raises critical questions about the balancing act between women's and national liberation struggles." (From Women Make Movies.)
--Available at Women Make Movies and (for viewing only) at UCB.
--For distribution info, see Videography for the African Continent, University of Wisconsin.
Uses the device of a young woman's search for the author of a love letter to explore the political and social environment in the former Portuguese overseas province of Portuguese Guinea, now the independent country of Guinea-Bissau. Explores generational differences through beautiful and sometimes surrealistic imagery.
--Available (for viewing only) at UCB. See also University of Minnesota Film & Video.
An "old-fashioned" type documentary on the Fali tribe of Northern Cameroon, featuring the daily activities of two young girls learning to be "women."
--Available (for viewing only) at UCB.
From cassette case: "In City Lovers a middle-aged white geologist is enamored by the charms of a "colored" cashier girl. Soon their casual relationship is a tender love affair. In Country Lovers, Paulus, the son of a wealthy white farmer, and Thebedi, the daughter of a black farmhand, have been friends since childhood. As they grow older, they become increasingly intimate until eventually they are lovers ... secret lovers. In both films the lovers must suffer the consequences of their intimacy since the South African Immorality Act forbids social relationships between couples of mixed race. Shot on location in South Africa. See also: Chip of Glass Ruby, Oral History, Country Lovers, City Lovers, Praise Good Climate-Friendly Inhabitants, Six Feet of the Country.
--For distribution info, see Videography for the African Continent, University of Wisconsin.
Daura and Katsina, Nigeria is a historical tour of two townships in Northern Nigeria, which were both ancient seats of Islamic culture and learning. The Hausa Woman is a demonstration of techniques used by Hausa women to beautify their bodies.
--Available (for viewing only) at UCB.
Ellen Kuzwayo lives in Soweto, the black township outside Johannesburg, but grew up on her family's beautiful farm near Thaba 'Nchu in Orange Free State which was seized by the South African Government in the 1970's as part of its policy of removing so called "black spots" from areas allocated to whites.
--Available (for viewing only) at UCB. For distribution info, see Videography for the African Continent, University of Wisconsin.
Profiles contemporary African women in four W. African Countries: Burkina Faso, Mali, Senegal, and Benin who are speaking out and organizing on their own behalf around issues which effect their lives. Examines the issues of AIDs prevention, female genital mutilation, the democratization movement, and grassroots economic development.
--Available (for viewing only) at UCB. See also University of Minnesota Film & Video.
Read more about Femmes aux yeux ouverts.
--For distribution info, see Videography for the African Continent, University of Wisconsin.
Film examines how scholars have uncovered the remarkable connections between the Gullah people of South Carolina and the people of Sierra Leone and how the Gullahs incorporated many aspects of African culture including the language into the daily life of the plantations. Film concludes with a delegation of Gullah people traveling from the United States to Sierra Leone to trace the roots of their heritage.
--Available (for viewing only) at UCB. See also University of Minnesota Film & Video.
Produced by a Tanzanian woman, Flora M'mbubu, shot in Tanzania with an all African crew, "From Sun Up" is a candid, authentic picture of the dawn-to-dusk, life-sustaining efforts of the women of black Africa to survive and prosper. It portrays the woman's multiple roles as provider, mother, water-carrier, wood-gatherer, cook, and entrepreneur. It reflects the condition of women everywhere, especially those of the Third World.
--For distribution info, see Videography for the African Continent, University of Wisconsin.
Filmed interview with two 16 year old schoolgirls, one from the black township of Soweto, and one from the wealthy white suburbs of Johannesburg. The girls talk about their lives and the South Africa each girl believes in.
--Available at University of Minnesota Film & Video.
--For more information, contact African American Studies Dept. Reading Room, UCB.
The first program in a trilogy focusing on the Hamar, an isolated people of Southwestern Ethiopia. In this film Duka, a young unmarried Hamar girl, learns what awaits her in life from the older women of her tribe. Their often humorous conversations range from pregnancy and growing old to relationships with men. Although the men are dominant, the women are not servile. Shows harvest celebrations and the blessing ceremony for a new baby.
The second program in a trilogy focusing on the Hamar, an isolated people of Southwestern Ethiopia. This film shows Duka and her friend, Gardi, as they prepare to marry men they have never met. The film follows Duka, from the build-up to the marriage, from the all night vigil with girlfriends, to farewells when the bride is taken away at dawn to the village of her husband's family, the arrival in the village and the preparation of the prospective bride for the ceremony by the mother-in-law.
The third program in a trilogy focusing on the Hamar, an isolated people of Southwestern Ethiopia. This film shows Duka, now a mother with two young children. Her life is dominated by caring for them and her husband, Sago. Although Sago and Duka seem to have an affectionate marriage, he beats her when provoked. She accepts this behavior for she believes it is a man's way of loving. Film also shows the ceremony of Sago's cousin's initiation into manhood.
--Available (for viewing only) at UCB.
"Originally intended as a film about internationally renowned feminist writer Nawal El Saadawi, Hidden Faces develops into a fascinating portrayal of Egyptian women's lives in a Muslim society. In this collaborative documentary, Safaa Fathay, a young Egyptian woman living in Paris, returns home to interview the famed writer and activist, but becomes disillusioned with her. Illuminated by passages from El Saadawi's work, the film follows Fathay's journey to her family home and discovers similar complex frictions between modernity and tradition. Her mother's decision to return to the veil after 20 years and her cousin's clitoridectomies reveal a disturbing renewal of fundamentalism. Filmed in Cairo, El Minia and rural villages, this absorbing documentary broaches the contradictions of feminism in a Muslim environment and the profound attachments to traditional family life." (From Women Make Movies.)
--Available at Women Make Movies and (for viewing only) at UCB.
--For distribution info, see Videography for the African Continent, University of Wisconsin.
Laura is the first woman to stake her claim under the law to what had been exclusively a male preserve; driving a taxi.
--Available (for viewing only) at UCB.
--Available at University of Minnesota Film & Video.
Follows the day-to-day lives of five black South African women in the townships around Cape Town, exposing the inhumane legacy of the apartheid system. Reveals how township life has necessitated involvement in the struggle for better living conditions.
--Available at University of Minnesota Film & Video.
Film features Mammy Water (a water deity worshipped in Nigeria) rituals and interviews devotees and their leaders. Beautiful, complex scenes of women sharing alcoholic beverages and dancing into trances on long, hot afternoons in reverence to Mammy Water open up possibilities of configuring the "power" of women.
--Available (for viewing only) at UCB.
1.) A Young woman must overcome her fear of traditional healers to regain
her health. InSwahili with English subtitles.
2.) A Short documentary about life in the countryside where
cooperation and sharing are important aspects of community life. Narrated
in English.
----Available (for viewing only) at UCB. See also Videography for the African Continent, University of Wisconsin.
The Masai are animal herders in the East African Rift Valley. This program looks at the women of the tribe--from childhood through marriage to old age--and their role in a completely male-dominated society.
--Available at University of Minnesota Film & Video.
"This fascinating documentary follows two Nigerian women's different experiences of a traditional rite of passage. Young virgins, irabo spend five weeks in "fattening rooms," emerging to dance before the villagers and to be married. The girls wear heavy copper coils on their legs to enforce inactivity as they are waited on and honored by families. One of the young village women, Florence, is keen to take part. But Akisiye, who returns from the city at her father's behest, is not certain she wants to. Combining voice-over and interviews, Monday's Girls documents tradition, modernity, dissent and contradiction in African women's lives. " (From Women Make Movies.").
--Available at Women Make Movies and (for viewing only) at UCB. See also University of Minnesota Film & Video.
Read more about Monday's Girls.
Told in her own words and song, the program covers 27 years in the life of N!ai, a !Kung San woman from Namibia's Kalahari Desert. Film footage of N!ai's early years, when her small band still roamed freely as gatherers/hunters over 15,000 square miles of desert, contrasts sharply with her present, and radically different, life on a government-run reserve. Provides a comprehensive and historical look at a traditional culture that is rapidly disappearing.
----Available (for viewing only) at UCB. See also University of Minnesota Film & Video.
UN Decade for Women Conference
--For distribution info, see Videography for the African Continent, University of Wisconsin.
----Available (for viewing only) at UCB. See also Videography for the African Continent, University of Wisconsin.
>From the cassette case: "The first film about the South African struggle made by South Africans...one woman's personal fight for freedom. Her bravery, her emotional traumas, and her battles against undignified abuse. Her heroic and lonely fight against both the deep-rooted hatred and resentment of her people and the violent and oppressive hand of the apartheid system." Starring James Whyle, Gcini Mhlope, Charles Comyn and Norman Coombes. Directed by Darrell Roodt.
--For distribution info, see Videography for the African Continent, University of Wisconsin.
In many societies, a woman is valued according to her reproductive efficiency. Her status in family and community depends on her ability to bear children of the desired number and of the desired sex. Film investigates the condition of women in Nigeria and India through interviews with husbands, wives, clergy and family planning personnel.
--Available through Women Make Movies and (for viewing only) at UCB.
"Women are the focus but not the object of Trinh T. Minh-ha's influential first film, a complex visual study of women in rural Senegal. Reassemblage reflects on documentary fillmaking and the ethnographic representation of culture. 'With uncanny eloquence, Reassemblage distills sounds and images of Senegalese villagers and their surroundings to reconsider the premises and methods of ethnographic filmmaking. By disjunctive editting and a probing narration this 'documentary' strikingly counterpoints the authoritative stance typical of the National Geographic approach...'" (Laura Thielan, from Women Make Movies.)
--Available at Women Make Movies and (for viewing only) at UCB.
This revealing documentary offers a rare view of daily life in West Africa. Shot in Senegal, Selbe focuses upon the social role and economic responsibility of women in African society. Because men often leave their communities to earn money in the city, women are left with the sole responsibility for their families. One woman's personal struggle reflects the broader issues facing many women in developing countries. (From Women Make Movies.)
--Available at Women Make Movies and (for viewing only) at UCB.
"During the past two decades, more than 2 mill. refugees have left Ethiopia. Famine, poverty, and political strife as well as the religious persecution caused by Eritrea's annexation have already cost countless lives. Narrated by Salem Mekuria, an Ethiopian filmmaker in the US, this lucid documentary presents the life stories of three women refugees in neighboring Sudan. It traces the attempts of individual women to survive the displacement, resettlement camps,. and ineffectual bureaucracy. (From Women Make Movies.)
--Available at Women Make Movies and (for viewing only) at UCB.
Read more aboutSidet: Forced Exile.
Surveys a typical workday in the lives of Mozambican refugee women in Tanzania who manually mine gravel used for making concrete for urban building projects.
--Available at University of Minnesota Film & Video.
The lot of women in Burkina Faso is not an easy one. They work in the fields without adequate recompense and have the added work of child care, home care, and cooking. Women working in the cities' factories are hardly better off. Polygamy is accepted and is considered a way of sharting the burdens of work. The future will be better only when women are better educated, have the same job opportunities as men and have their own reasonable source of income.
--Available (for viewing only) at UCB.
Egypt was the first Arab country where women marched in political demonstrations (1919); the first Arab country where women took off the veil (1923); the first Arab country to offer free public secular education to women (1924). Today the granddaughters of those early feminists are putting on a modest garb, sometimes with full face veil and gloves, which they call Islamic dress. The film explores the different facets of the new "veiling".
--Available (for viewing only) at UCB. See also Videography for the African Continent, University of Wisconsin.
A meditation on women's roles as defined by orthodox Islamic laws. It is one of the first productions by a rising wave of South Asian women visual artists. Examines familial and societal restrictions placed on South Asian women.
--Available (for viewing only) at UCB.
A poetic and political film about female genital mutilation. This film unlocks some of the cultural and political complexities surrounding the issue. Interviews with women from Senegal, Burkina Faso, The Gambia, the US, and England.
--Available at Women Make Movies and (for viewing only) at UCB.
A documentary presenting the stories of three women from three African countries: Burkina Faso, Kenya and Zimbabwe. Each woman tells in her own words of the struggle to feed her family.
--Available through Women Make Movies and (for viewing only) at UCB. See also University of Minnesota Film & Video.
--For distribution info, see Videography for the African Continent, University of Wisconsin.
--Stephanie Urdang, Mozambique, 1984; 30 mins.
--For distribution info, see Videography for the African Continent, University of Wisconsin.
Niger is a traditionally Islamic country where authorized polygamy and Muslim fundamentalism clash with the country's struggle for democracy. In the elections in 1993, men voted by proxy for their different wives and daughters. Women who speak out about their rights have been physically attacked and ex-communicated by the ayatollahs. Working together, women are the most ardent defenders of democracy, which offers the best hopes of winning the equal rights still denied them.
--Available at Women Make Movies.
Film examines the events that lead up to a fertility ceremony of the Maasai women in Loita, Kenya. Explanations and insights into the significance of the ceremony are in the form of interviews with the women themselves.
--For distribution info, see Videography for the African Continent, University of Wisconsin.
This film documents the role of women in the struggle for South African overthrow of Apartheid rule. It focuses in part upon women's strikes in protest of laws that would require women to carry an identification card. Interviews with members and leaders of the FSAW and ANC Women's League, newsreel footage and still photographs portray the many demonstrations and protests staged by black women in South Africa since 1948. The South African government's systematic attempt to wear down the resolve of the striking women during the early period of the struggle are portrayed, as is the government's decision to change tactics and begin a more violent campaign which including opening fire on large crowds. The film is testimony to the strength and resolve of South African women, a quality which was also required for their day-to-day struggle as wives, mothers, and daughters in the South African townships.
--Available (for viewing only) at UCB. See also University of Minnesota Film & Video.
R ead more aboutYou Have Struck a Rock.
Zulei, a 14-year-old girl about to be married, is the focus of this program, which documents the life of a people whose ancestors were nomads and whose customs and habits have changed very little across millennia.
--Available (for viewing only) at UCB.
Bullfrog
Films
PO Box 149, Oley, PA., 19547
fax: (610) 370-1978 call: 779-8226
University of Minnesota Film & Video
UCB Ethnography Videography (University of California at Berkeley Media Resources Center)
UCB Videography of Africa (University of California at Berkeley Media Resources Center)
Videography for the African Continent, Since 1980
African Studies Program, University of Wisconsin
Videocassettes for African Studies
University of Wisconsin - Madison Learning Support Services - Media Library
WOMEN MAKE MOVIES, INC.,
225 Lafayette Street, Suite 212, New York, NY 10012
phone: (212) 925-0606.
fax: 1 (212) 925-2052
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