This revolutionary bombshell by Sarah Maldoror chronicles the awakening of Angola’s independence movement. Based on a true story, Sambizanga follows a young woman as she makes her way from the outskirts of Luanda toward the city’s center looking for her husband after his arrest by the Portuguese authorities—an incident that will ultimately help to ignite a national uprising. Featuring a cast of nonprofessionals—many of whom were themselves involved in anticolonial resistance—this landmark work of political cinema honors the essential roles of women, as well as the hardships they endure, in the global struggle for liberation.Read More »
Sarah Maldoror
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Sarah Maldoror – Sambizanga [Criterion 4K] (1972)
1971-1980AngolaDramaPoliticsSarah MaldororThe Female Gaze -
Sarah Maldoror – Le passager du Tassili (1987)
1981-1990ComedyDramaFranceSarah MaldororA man loses his passport on the way back to France after a trip to Algeria.Read More »
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Sarah Maldoror – Aimé Césaire – un homme une terre (1976)
1971-1980DocumentaryFranceSarah MaldororQuote:
Documentary on the négritude movement through one of its founders, Aimé Césaire.Read More » -
Sarah Maldoror – Et les chiens se taisaient (1974)
1971-1980DocumentaryFranceSarah MaldororShort FilmQuote:
Recordings of extracts from the Aimé Césaire play : in a long, pain-racked poem declaimed before his mother, the rebel cries his revolt against the enslavement of his people.Read More » -
Sarah Maldoror – Monangambeee (1968)
1961-1970African CinemaAngolaPoliticsSarah MaldororShort FilmQuote:
“Monangambeee” was a rallying cry used by activists during Angola’s anti-colonial liberation struggle to gather villages together. The film of the same title addresses Portuguese arrogance towards Angolan culture. Sarah Maldoror draws on a novella by José Luandino Vieira, the story of a political prisoner, to make a film about humiliation, solidarity and resistance.Read More » -
Sarah Maldoror – Sambizanga (1973)
1971-1980AngolaDramaPoliticsSarah MaldororThe Female GazePlot Summary of the Film
Sambizanga opens in a coastal village where the men are employed on a construction gang. We follow Domingos, a big, handsom tractor driver, as he as a friendly conversation with Sylvester, a Portuguese engineer. The opening credits appear and we hear the song Monanagambée on the sountrack. Domingos returns home (kicking a soccer ball around with some neighborhood kids en route), where his wife, Maria, awaits him with their infant son. They have a peaceful dinner together. Domingos visits a friend, and brings along a secret revolutionary flyer. We then see Domingos and Maria in bed together with their baby; they take turns holding the boy, trying to calm him into sleep.Read More »
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Sarah Maldoror – Scala Milan AC (2003)
2001-2010DocumentaryFranceSarah MaldororQuote:
A group of young people from the St. Denis banlieu, from different ethnic and geographic backgrounds, participate in a school contest to tell their neighborhood, whose prize is a trip to Milan. With the collaboration of the historical jazz musician Archie Shepp, they create a poetic hymn to the racialized and invisible France that rises above marginalization. The film, also produced by another filmmaker, Agnès Varda, is a collaboration on its own bill between the filmmaker and teenagers.Read More » -
Sarah Maldoror – Un dessert pour Constance AKA Dessert for Constance (1981)
1981-1990ComedyFranceSarah MaldororTVIn the 70’s, Bokolo and Mamadou sweepers in the city of Paris, looking for a way to pay for the return home of one of their sick comrades. When they discover an old book of recipes in the trash, the idea came to participate in a televised game of decline precisely the ingredients of the best dishes of French cuisine. They memorize the recipes sauces, puddings and desserts.Read More »
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Sarah Maldoror – Miro (1979)
1971-1980DocumentaryFranceSarah MaldororQuote:
Brief piece for the television series Aujourd’hui en France (Today in France). The review of an exhibition by Miró at the Maeght Foundation offers the opportunity to approach the surrealist artist from the central themes of the filmmaker. The theater, the interrelation between the arts and the transformation of the children’s experience through art. The set turns out to be a work of Joan Miró translated into real life. First screening after her television showing in 1980Read More »