UGANDA HOLDS 2ND EURO-AFRICAN KAMPALA FILM FESTIVAL

BY BAMUTURAKI MUSINGUZI

MOTORBIKE taxis commonly known as boda-bodas are playing a major role in Uganda’s transport system but at the same time they are also among the main cause of road accidents and as a means of crime.

The streets of Kampala in particular are always grid-locked and congested with traffic and the fastest way to beat the notorious jam is to jump on a boda-boda and weave your way to your destination.

A new Ugandan film titled The Boda Boda Thieves (‘Abaabi ba boda boda’ in Luganda), by Donald Mugisha and James Tayler attempts to tell the daily life of those who depend on these machines in an urban setting both as a means of income and transport. The men who ride these bikes have a reputation for being tough hustlers.

The Boda Boda Thieves, a 90-minute social drama released this year focuses on adolescent Abel and his poor family. Hope for a better life has led his family from a small Ugandan village to the country’s capital Kampala. A boda-boda, bought from family savings is the only hope of pushing them out of poverty.

The poor family’s hopes of finding a better life in the city have turned into a nightmare of daily subsistence. When young Abel is first entrusted with the family boda-boda it isn’t too long before things go wrong.

On his first day of riding, Abel and his crook buddy realize they can make a lot more money by stealing bags and cellphones off pedestrians than through honest rides. After the first day’s big take, though, Abel finds his boda boda stolen, setting him on a frantic scramble through the streets of Kampala to get the bike back before it is stripped and sold for parts.

The film is a unique portrait of desperation. Through the eyes of Abel we gain a deep insight into an urban African society and its dark sides. With him we experience how city residents and newcomers remain strangers to each other. The film reveals that traditional values can keep societies together; still they have to be reinterpreted within a modern urban context to offer a starting point for a more hopeful future.

The Boda Boda Thieves is a homage and tribute to the great Italian neo-realist film The Bicycle Thief directed by Vittorio De Sica in 1948. The film is not a remake but an original work freely inspired by the classic. It however endeavours to remain true to the spirit of its model and updates realism with a youthful edge in the middle of Africa.

The Boda Boda Thieves was among the 20 European and African long feature films, including Euro-African co-productions funded by the EU-ACP Film Programme, 10 African short films produced by Maisha Film Lab, special screenings for schools, and video clips of the 2015 European Year for Development that featured at 2nd Euro-African Kampala Film Festival that run from June 16 – 27, 2015 at Cineplex Cinema, Oasis Mall in Kampala. Tickets sold for only Ushs3, 000 ($0.87), per movie.

The festival was presented by the Delegation of the European Union (EU) to Uganda, the Embassies and Cultural Institutes of the European Union Member States, in partnership with the Embassy of Norway, Maisha Film Lab, Garage Films and Kampala Capital City Authority (KCCA) and with the operational coordination by Alliance Francaise Kampala.

The Euro-African Kampala Film Festival is a platform to market European, African and Ugandan films. It shows the cultural diversity and richness of Europe and Africa, and gives opportunity to discover young talents from Uganda and other African regions.

The festival aims to create a platform for a dialogue about recent film productions with the citizens of Kampala. The festival is expected to enhance the opening of doors for possible collaborations between European and African professionals.

The festival opened with the Italian comedy film La Nostra Terra (2014) directed by Giulio Manfredonia. Set on a tomato farm and screened in Italian with English subtitles the film shows the power that the Mafia still hold over some sections of the Italian society.

The land of Alfio Bonavita, who 30 years ago was forced give away his farm to the local Mafioso Nicola Sansone, is now made available by the State to a group of people that has formed a cooperative. Although their agricultural sense is poor and their know-how in farming non-existent, they start working the land, boycotted daily by unseen powers that try to hamper their activity in every way.

They apply for help to the anti-Mafia board that sends over Filippo, very competent in anti-Mafia laws and regulations but completely inexperienced in handling practical problems. He is petrified at first by the gigantic task he’s facing and has to resist the urge to just clear the field, but the curious dynamics of this peculiar troop keeps him going.

Soon Filippo will have to face his own fears, motivated by his sense of duty and one thing that keeps him is his budding sentiment for beautiful Rossana, the soul and head of this incongruous anti-Mafia gang.

The other films included GriGris (Mahamat Saleh Haroun, Chad, 2013, 101m); the German award-winning drama Age of Cannibals (Johannes Naber, 2014, 1h 33m); Morten Tyldum’s film The Imitation Game (UK, 2014, 114min); Daniel Gordon’s 90-minute documentary film The John Akii-Bua Story: An African Tragedy (UK, 2008); De Marathon (Diederick Koopal, Netherlands, 2012, 107min); Marussia (Eva Pervolovici, France, 2015, 82min); O Heroi (Zeze Gamboa, Angola, 2004, 97min); and Scarred (Judy Kibinge, Kenya, 2015, 60min), among others.

Building on the success of the first Euro-African Kampala Film Festival in 2014, this year's edition presented an enriched formula with more countries represented, more guests, professional workshops, master-classes on scriptwriting, discussions, projections for schools, and even a Wi-Fi Lounge where viewers were able to sit and discuss, read and browse the internet to deepen their knowledge of the themes raised by each film.

Ends.