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Sacred Places Saint John of Las Vegas
CAMEROON / FRANCE
Cameroon-born, Paris-based filmmaker Jean-Marie Téno serves as
USA
John (Steve Buscemi), a compulsive gambler, flees Las Vegas in an effort
Director: Jean-Marie Téno narrator as well as director of this documentary about the role the Director: Hue Rhodes to straighten out his life and winds up in a desk job at an Albuquerque
Producer: Jean-Marie Téno cinema plays in the daily struggle for survival in the tiny African country Executive Producers: Wren Arthur,
car insurance company – which is where he meets Jill (Sarah Silverman),
Cinematographer: Crystel Fournier
of Burkina Faso. His journey begins in the St. Leon district of the
Steve Buscemi, David S. Greathouse,
an oddball coworker who takes a shine to him. Meanwhile, John’s
Spike Lee, Stanley Tucci
Editor: Christiane Bangley
nation’s capital, Ouagadougou, during the biennial Pan-African Film boss decides to send him on a special mission to investigate a possibly
Producers: Mark Burton,
2009 / color / 71 min.
and Television Festival. But Téno’s concern is not the festival – where he fraudulent insurance claim under the supervision of the company’s best
MS: A to Z
once had great success with his own film Chief!, an exploration of how
Lawrence Mattis, Kelly McCormick,
agent, Virgil (the Emmy-nominated Romany Malco) – who, it turns out,
MS: A to Z
il
Matt Wall
dictatorial rule permeated daily life in Cameroon in the 1990s. Instead, is an intimidating taskmaster. Even worse, the accident happened in the
il
he focuses on Votre Ciné Club, a grass-roofed gathering place in which
Screenwriter: Hue Rhodes
desert near, of all places, Sin City.
E F
Cinematographer: Giles Nuttgens
JEan-MariE TÉno
Nanema Boubaker screens films from all over the world on a large TV
E F
h
Jean-Marie Téno has been directing for spellbound audiences. Promotion for the enterprise is handled by
Editor: Annette Davey
h
T
The supposed victim in the case is a stripper named Tasty D Lite, now
T
and producing films on the history of
Boubaker’s friend Jules César Bamouni, who takes to the streets playing
Cast: Steve Buscemi, Romany Malco,
bound to a wheelchair. Despite the evidence she provides John in the
Africa for over 20 years. He has been
the djembe, a traditional drum, to announce what’s showing. But
Sarah Silverman, Peter Dinklage,
form of a handicapped-accessible lap dance, Virgil continues to insist
honored at film festivals worldwide, Tim Blake Nelson
winning the Don Quixote Award
whether it’s an action film from Jackie Chan or a Bollywood extrava- the claim is fraudulent. Thus proceeding apace, the two men find
2009 / color / 85 min.
for Clandestine at the Fribourg
ganza, the feature is usually foreign. themselves in a series of encounters with ever more eccentric characters,
International Film Festival in 1996. In including a mostly nude militant and a carnival human torch beset by
2009, he was a visiting Copeland Fellow
This intersection between the daily grind of Ouagadougou and technical difficulties. All the while, even as the abnormally cheerful
at Amherst College.
international glamour is thus actually a disjunct: Sacred Places contrasts Jill stalks him and his antagonism toward Virgil grows, John continues
local culture with a cinematic dream world containing little that relates
huE rhoDES
to grapple with the riptide of his gaming addiction – until he realizes
Selected Filmography
Starting his career as a software
The Colonial Misunderstanding (2004)
to Africa. Similarly, it compares the efforts of Boubaker and Bamouni that hitting the jackpot in life might have nothing to do with games or
engineer, Hue Rhodes cofounded
A Trip to the Country (2000)
with the time-honored role of the griot, a storyteller who embodies the money.
Bluelight.com. After the company was
Chief! (1999) zeitgeist of a place and the conscience and memory of its inhabitants.
absorbed by Kmart, Rhodes pursued
Clandestine (1996)
Offering generous glimpses into everyday life in St. Leon in the process,
filmmaking, enrolling in New York
First-time feature filmmaker Hue Rhodes has loosely translated Dante’s
Africa, I Will Pluck You Clean (1993)
Téno uses these contrasts to explore how international and national University’s Tisch School of the Arts. Inferno for the silver screen with this offbeat tale of road-trip redemp-
economics, politics, and modernization affect cultural identity.
His short film Practice won the Golden
tion. Among the producing partners on the film are Spike Lee – Rhodes’s
Starfish at the Hamptons International
mentor at New York University’s graduate film program – and actor
Film Festival. Saint John of Las Vegas is
Stanley Tucci.
Sponsored by:
his first feature film.
In cooperation with: Alliance Française de Denver
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