When the champagne overflowed high glasses in anticipation of the change of millennium, the pace was much more leisurely in the Sokolo village in Mali in West-Africa. This is a film about the different ways of understanding time, to meet an artificial date, on the divide between Europe and Africa. While the reports from an excited Paris streamed through the radio waves, life went on as usual in a village where phone conversations are carried out through specialists in phone technology, automatic opening doors are regarded as fairytales, and the streets are trafficked by donkeys and bicycles.

Even though the movie remains quiet and everything but hastened it does not take a passive stance. Inspired by Frantz Fanon it strongly encourages us to “not fold your arms in the sterile stance of a spectator. For life is not spectacle. For a screaming man is not a dancing bear.” This is essential viewing for anyone who wants to understand Africa.

Abderrahmane Sissako was born in Mauritania in 1961, grew up in Mali, and studied film at the Federal State Film Institute in Moscow. He has directed a series of prize-winning films including Life on Earth (1998), Waiting for Happiness (2002), Bamako (2006) and Timbuktu (2014) which deal with the themes of exile, and the relationship between Africa and the West through a typical combination of documentary, fiction, politics and poetry.

Artist talk: Abderrahmane Sissako
Film: Timbuktu
Time: October 14, 17:00 o'clock
Location: Filmens Hus
In connection with the screening there will be a conversation between the director Abderrahmane Sissako and Thor Joachim Haga of Montages.
Film: Timbuktu
Time: October 15, 19:00 o'clock.
Location: Victoria 4
In connection with the screening there will be a conversation with the director Abderrahmane Sissako.
Film: Life on Earth
Time: October 16, 21:30 o'clock.
Location: Klingenberg 2
In connection with the screening there will be an introduction and Q&A with the director Abderrahmane Sissako.
Film: Bamako
Time: October 17, 13:00 o'clock.
Location: Victoria 1.
In connection with the screening there will be an introduction and Q&A with the director Abderrahmane Sissako.

Original title La vie sur terre

Year 1998

Director Abderrahmane SISSAKO

Screenplay Abderrahmane SISSAKO

Cinematography Jacques BESSE

Cast Nana BABY, Mohamed SISSAKO

Runtime 1h 1m

Format 35mm

Links IMDb