Sembène!, Black Girl 

“Whether it’s DeMille, Hitchcock, the Senegalese filmmaker Sembène…we’re all walking in their footsteps every day.”—Martin Scorsese

Though the son of a fisherman and fifth-grade dropout, trailblazing filmmaker and novelist Ousmane Sembène (1923–2007) is generally considered the “father of African cinema.” Using rare archival footage and exclusive materials, Samba Gadjigo, the man who knew Sembène best, tells the story of one of the most monumental filmmakers of our time. (86 mins., DCP)

A young woman leaves Senegal to live out her dreams in France, only to become gradually deadened by her work as a nanny. Sembène’s first film, Black Girl, remains one of the most significant achievements in film history. The great film critic Manny Farber declared it the best movie of 1969, “a perfect short story that is unlike anything in the film library.” (65 mins., DCP)