LOCARNO OPEN DOORS
Maimouna, a Parisian of Malian ori- gin who returns to the country she left as a child to bury her exiled father. The picture revolves around her
efforts to travel from the capital of Bamako to her father’s home town of Gao in the north of the country. Malian singer and actress Fatou-
mata Diawara has signed on to co- star as Edith, a middle-class girl with a crazy streak, who offers to accompany Maimouna on her motorbike. “There is a real energy surround-
Jean-Marie Teno Secret Faces Cameroon
Dir Jean-Marie Teno Prod Les Films du Raphia
Secret Faces (Toutes Voiles Dehors), the latest project from leading Afri- can documentary maker Jean-Marie Teno, explores how an increasing number of women in Niger are wearing veils and challenging popu- lar Western perceptions about the practice. “I live in France, a country where
there has been a lot of controversy surrounding the wearing of the veil,” says Cameroon-born Teno, who has been based in Paris since 1977. “This controversy raises a lot of interesting questions about how we defi ne who is free and who is not.” The documentary will revolve
around Jamaica-born academic Antoinette Tidjani Alou, a professor at Niger’s Abdou Moumouni Uni- versity in the capital city, Niamey, who is married to a local man. Her research into the growing popularity of the veil acts as a thread between the stories of several Niger women who have adopted the prac- tice, revealing their motivation is rarely religious. They range from an unmarried woman who started wearing the veil to attract a suitor, to a pro-contraception campaigner who used it to hide her identity as she delivered illegal educational pamphlets on the subject. Teno’s documentaries include
2009’s Sacred Places, exploring the place of cinema in African society, which screened at festivals including Sheffi eld Doc/Fest and IDFA.
n 8 Screen International August 2012 The production, which Teno is
producing though his company, Les Films du Raphia, is at the writing and development stage with plans to start shooting early next year.
Shadows Of The Sugarcane Mauritius
Dir David Constantin Prod Caméléon Production
The lush landscape and tropical beaches of the Indian Ocean island of Mauritius may be popular back- drops for Bollywood films, but locally produced fare is rare and generally in short or medium-length format.
Shadows Of The Sugarcane (Lom-
braz Kan) will follow the fate of workers from a defunct sugar-cane factory as they try to forge new lives in a country increasingly dependent on tourism. “Sugar was Mauritius’ main
source of income for centuries,” says director-producer David Constantin, who operates under the Caméléon Production banner. “You used to look down on sugar-
cane plantations as you fl ew into the island; now you look down on golf courses, hotel complexes and luxury villas. The film shows how the demise of the sugar-cane industry has impacted the lives of Mauritians at every level.” Constantin’s previous credits
include the short fi lm Made In Mau- ritius about a peasant who is faced with the complexity of the modern world when he tries to buy a fuse for his radio.
Producer Tom Dercourt of Paris- based Cinema Defacto describes actress Aïssa Maïga’s Mali-set road movie We’ve Got To Leave Bamako, as a sort of African Thelma & Louise. Maïga is set to star as 30-year-old
David Constantin
Constantin has been developing Shadows Of The Sugarcane for three years, co-writing the latest draft with French screenwriter Sabrina Com- peyron. Constantin is also trying to foster
other local film-making talent. In 2007, he created the body Porteurs d’Images which runs the short fi lm festival Ile Courts and is also devel- oping a production network aimed at connecting film-makers in the Indian Ocean region.
We’ve Got to Leave Bamako Mali
Dir Aïssa Maïga Prod Cinema Defacto
ing these two African women who are both on a voyage of discovery in their different ways,” says Dercourt. Due to the current unrest in
northern Mali, Dercourt says the shoot — scheduled for next year — will most likely be transferred to neighbouring Burkina Faso. Maïga, who is of Malian, Senega-
lese and Gambian descent, is best known internationally for acting in Cédric Klapisch’s Russian Dolls, Michael Haneke’s Hidden and Abderrahmane Sissako’s Bamako. She has just come off the set of Michel Gondry’s Mood Indigo. Cinema Defacto has a strong
track record of working in territo- ries with little by way of cinema infrastructure. Past productions include the Turkey-set Chemins d’O and Haiti-set Eat, For This Is My Body. “You have to take each produc-
tion on an individual basis, adapting to the conditions of whichever coun- try you’re shooting in,” says Der- court.
s
Aïssa Maïga
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