The School of Global & Public Service, the Center for Integrative Learning, the School of Media & the Arts, and the Media Studies program present: The Global Justice, Past & Present Film Festival. Albertine Cinémathèque is part of the French for All initiative by Villa Albertine and Albertine Foundation and is made possible by the support of the Centre National du Cinéma et de l’Image Animée (CNC).
All screenings are in the Powerhouse, Weissberg Auditorium at 7:30 pm.
Wednesday, February 4th: Dahomey
Winner of the coveted Golden Bear prize at the 2024 Berlinale, DAHOMEY is an immersive and astounding work of art from Mati Diop – director of the award-winning Atlantics. Delving into real perspectives on far-reaching issues surrounding appropriation, self-determination and restitution, this acclaimed documentary is a poetic look at a seldom-discussed history.
Taking place in November 2021, the film takes as its subject 26 royal treasures of the Kingdom of Dahomey, which, along with thousands of others, were plundered by French colonial troops in 1892. As these artifacts are due to leave Paris to return to their country of origin: the present-day Republic of Benin, Diop questions how they should be received in a country that has reinvented itself in their absence, using ethereal voiceover and footage of debating students at the University of Abomey-Calavi to offer multiple perspectives.
By turns invigorating and thought-provoking, Diop’s latest uses compelling non-traditional storytelling techniques to powerfully bring the past into the present, offering an affecting though altogether singular conversation piece that is as spellbinding as it is essential.
Friday, February 6th: Meeting with Pol Pot
Democratic Kampuchea (Cambodia) – 1978. Three journalists are invited by the Khmer Rouge to conduct an exclusive interview of the regime’s leader, Pol Pot. The country seems ideal. But behind the Potemkin village, the Khmer Rouge regime is declining and the war with Vietnam threatens to invade the country. The regime is looking for culprits, secretly carrying out a large scale genocide. Under the eyes of the journalists, the beautiful picture cracks, revealing the horror. Their journey progressively turns into a nightmare. Freely inspired by journalist Elizabeth Becker’s account in When The War Was Over.
Wednesday, February 11th: Soundtrack to a coup d’état
United Nations, 1960: the Global South ignites a political earthquake, jazz musicians Abbey Lincoln and Max Roach crash the Security Council, Nikita Khrushchev bangs his shoe, and the U.S State Department swings into action, sending jazz ambassador Louis Armstrong to the Congo to deflect attention from CIA-backed coup. Director Johan Grimonprez explores a moment when jazz, colonialism, and espionage collided, constructing a riveting historical rollercoaster that illuminates the political machinations behind the 1961 assassination of Congolese leader Patrice Lumumba. The result is a revelatory from mercenaries and CIA operatives, speeches from Lumumba himself, and a veritable canon of jazz icons. Sundance award winner Soundtrack to a Coup d’Etat interrogates colonial history to tell an urgent and timely story that resonates more than ever in today’s geopolitical climate.
Friday, February 13th: No Chains, No Masters
In 1759, the Island of Mauritius in the Indian Ocean is under French colonial rule. The enslaved population working in the sugar cane plantation live in constant fear. Among them, 16-year-old Mati refuses to accept her fate. Unlike her father Massamba, who has grown disillusioned by years of oppression, Mati dreams of freedom and a life beyond the plantation. One night, desperate to flee the violence of her captors, Mati finds refuge in a remote part of the island rumored to be home to a community of runaway slaves. Her escape triggers a ruthless pursuit. The plantation owner hires the merciless slave owner Madame La Victoire and her sons to track her down. Massamba realizes the brutal consequences awaiting her daughter if she gets captured. He has no choice but to break free from his chains and embark on a perilous journey through the island’s dense jungle to find her. The father and daughter’s journey becomes a desperate fight for survival and a final, irreversible break from the colonial system that has defined their lives.
Wednesday, February 18th: Sudan, Remember Us
A collective portrait of the young Sudanese generation fighting for freedom through their words, poems, chants, and artistic creativity. Dreaming of a new Sudan led by a democratic and civilian government, they risk everything in their impassioned revolution to overthrow the country’s military regime in the tumultuous years leading up to a military coup and a war of power between Burhan head of the official army and Hemetti leader of the Rapid Support Forces militia who want to seize the country’s wealth forcing millions of people to take the roads of exile (it’s not a civil war).
Friday, February 20th: Terrorists in Retirement
Too controversial to be shown on French TV when first released – after its premiere at the Cannes Film Festival, in 1983 – Terrorists in Retirement is the story of men and women from Armenia, Poland, and Romania, mostly Jews, who fought the German occupation of Paris during World War II.
Most infamously, there were 21 members of the Manouchian Group, who were part of the FTP-MOI (Francs-tireurs et partisans – main-d’œuvre immigrée), the immigrant section of the French Resistance. They were executed by firing squad on February 21, 1944, after being found guilty of “terrorism” by a German military court. One woman was beheaded on her birthday.
In the film we meet seven surviving comrades of the executed resistance members. They demonstrate how to make and throw bombs, re-enact attacks on German officers at the actual locations throughout Paris, and share the stories of women who served as key intelligence agents. Seated at his sewing machine, a tailor, Raymond Kojitsky shows how he lit a bomb with his cigarette and threw it into a parking garage.
