Ouaga Girls

A group of young women from Ouagadougou study at a girl school to become auto mechanics. The classmates become their port of safety, joy and sisterhood, all while they are going through the life changing transition into becoming adults in a country boiling with political changes. In a country with youth unemployment at 52 percent, jobs are a hot issue. The young girls at a mechanics school in Burkina Faso’s capital Ouagadougou are right in the middle of a crucial point in life when their dreams, hopes and courage are confronted with opinions, fears and society’s expectations of what a woman should be. Using interesting narrative solutions, Theresa Traore Dahlberg depicts their last school years and at the same time succeeds in showing the country’s violent past and present. This is a feature-film debut and coming-of-age film with much warmth, laughs, heartbreak and depth.

Djembefola

African drummer leaves village, makes it big in the world. Great drumming!!

Histoire de sable

In a quest to rediscover the spiritual values of his own people, an African filmmaker from the Gourmantche tribe of Burkina Faso visits an Aboriginal band, the Atikamekw of northern Quebec. The resulting documentary is a dialogue between those who divine the future in the sand with those who use snow-encased sweat lodges to reconnect with the spiritual world.

Le Courage des Autres

An inside look at slavery in the country of Burkina Faso, The Courage Of Others follows the journey of a slave (played by Sotigui Kouyaté) being taken across the African desert by his captors.

Sankara et moi

At the time of the 30th anniversary of the death of Thomas Sankara, the African executive of a multinational mining company established in Africa, Tom - who has Americanized his first name Thomas - finds himself up against the ideal of his youth: each time he passes in front of a mirror, he sees himself with the red beret of the revolutionary leader on his head, and fears that his past will jeopardize his career...

The last Balafon Master

Les Orphelins de Sankara

Thomas Sankara came to power in Burkina Faso in 1983, with the promise of a revolutionary government that would transform the West African country. To help build the revolution, he sent 600 children — many orphans from rural areas — to be educated in Cuba. But after Sankara’s assassination, the children were stranded. The last would only return to Burkina Faso in 2005. SANKARA’S ORPHANS tells their stories through interviews with some of the 600, along with archival footage of their lives on Cuba’s Isle of Youth — where both Sankara and Fidel Castro came to visit. Along with their education, the children worked in the fields and received weapons training. This, combined with their idealism, frightened the new Burkina Faso regime, which worried they might return and take up arms.

Om våld

Based on powerful archival material documenting the most daring moments in the struggle for liberation in the Third World, this documentary is accompanied by classic text from The Wretched of the Earth by Frantz Fanon.

Sankara

Il paese delle persone integre

October 2014. Ouagadougou, the capital of Burkina Faso, is the scene of an unarmed uprising that ousts the dictator in power since 1987 and later staves off an attempted coup. In 2015, the country votes freely for the first time in its history, yet real change remains allusive, especially regarding ongoing economic exploitation by foreign companies. In one year of struggle and resistance, the film follows the daily life of four Burkinabes: a musician and leader of the revolution, a local political candidate, a miner engaged in the labor movement, and an impoverished mother, all sharing hopes that the elections will change the country’s path.

Sahel: Pátria ou Morte

Thomas Sankara, l'homme intègre

Thomas Sankara, former president of Burkina Faso, was known as "the African Che", and became famous in Africa due to his innovative ideas, his devastating humor, his spirit and his altruism. More than a classic biography, this film sheds light on the impact that this man and his politic made on Burkina Faso and Africa in general.

L'Homme des Arbres et des Haricots Verts

The life story of Daniel Balimá, a horticulturist with a disability in Burkina Faso.

Mémoire entre deux rives

This documentary follows the traces of the French colonization of the country Lobi. In this region of southwestern Burkina Faso, there is not a village, not a family that does not remember the suffering brought by the colonizers. Confronted with the archival documents of the administrators, the oral tradition, through its numerous testimonies, allows us to trace back nearly a century of history, from the arrival of the first Whites until today. This word also testifies to the individual, social or religious consequences of this often painful history. Between the past and the present, between the living words and the writings of the colonists, "Mémoire entre deux rives" is as much a quest for Lobi identity as a reflection on "civilising" France.

Everything Here Holds Its Inverse

Set in a Burkina Faso organic cotton weaving cooperative, a cacophonous cotton-spinning apparatus eats, digests, and takes a breath. Threads become the organs of a whirling, burping, guzzling machine animated by hands, looms, vats, cogs, and feet. Where does the machine end and the body begin? The weaving cooperative promises equitable remuneration for workers in an industry beholden to its colonial predecessor: today, Burkinabè cotton farmers live in permanent debt to cotton companies financed by European capital. By focusing on the repetitive labor unfolding within a cooperative that claims to serve its workers, Everything Here Holds Its Inverse examines the tension between empowerment and evolving oppressions. Can the ties that bind and define also set free?

Ceux de la colline

Like a modern-day version of Deadwood, a makeshift gold mine on the remote Diosso hillside in Burkina Faso has attracted a swarm of gold-diggers and dynamite blasters, healers and dealers, vendors and prostitutes, children, holy men and barbers. Living in the promiscuous closeness of a crowded and improvised gold town, these men and women are recklessly determined to find the gold that will change their lives. The film explores their desperate quest for fortune and elusive happiness. The gold rush is relentless.

Mögöbalu, Les Maîtres des Tambours d'Afrique

Mikelande: L'exil, la mémoire et le griot

Exiled after Haiti’s political struggles of the 90s, Mikerlande—a former activist and now entrepreneur—rekindles memories of resilience and commitment. Through griot, she shares a story of struggle, legacy, and strength, bridging past and present to preserve her heritage.