Sisters in Law: Stories from a Cameroon Court | |
---|---|
![]() State prosecutor Vera Ngassa, left, and Court President Beatrice Ntuba. | |
Directed by | Florence Ayisi Kim Longinotto |
Produced by | Kim Longinotto |
Starring | Vera Ngassa Beatrice Ntuba |
Edited by | Oliver Huddleston |
Music by | D'Gary |
Distributed by | Women Make Movies |
Release date |
|
Running time | 104 minutes |
Country | Cameroon |
Language | Cameroonian Pidgin English |
Sisters in Law is a 2005 Cameroonian documentary film by Florence Ayisi and Kim Longinotto, portraying aspects of women's lives and work within the judicial system in western Cameroon. Following four separate cases, the film focuses on state prosecutor Vera Ngassa and judge Beatrice Ntuba as they attempt to bring justice for victims of gender violence.
The film centres around four cases in Cameroon involving violence against women. Complainants include Manka, a six-year-old girl who run aways from her abusive aunt's care; Sonita, a 10-year-old girl who accuses her neighbour of rape; and Amina, a Muslim woman who is trying to divorce her husband due to domestic abuse. Their cases are processed and heard by Vera Ngassa, a state prosecutor, and Beatrice Ntuba, a court judge. Manka's aunt pleads guilty and is sentenced to a custodial prison sentence; Sonita's rapist pleads not guilty, but is found guilty by the court; and Amina's husband is fined, with a separate sharia court granting her request for a divorce. [1]
Ayisi and Longinotto were supported by Women Make Movies, who also distributed the film. Ayisi and Longinotto were inspired by Kumba Town in West Cameroon, where Ayisi grew up, and originally envisioned making a film about the local police force, before deciding to follow the judicial system. [2] The film features the case of Amina, which became the first case in Cameroon criminal history where a man was successfully convicted of abusing his wife.
The film was screened at multiple film festivals throughout 2005, including the Cannes Film Festival, Toronto International Film Festival and the Telluride Film Festival. [3] In the US, it aired on the PBS series Independent Lens .
Sisters in Law has won many film awards including the prestigious Prix Art et Essai at the Cannes Film Festival in May 2005, [4] Best Documentary Film at Hawaii International Film Festival, Audience Award at International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (IDFA), Best Documentary on a Contemporary issue, Grierson Award, Social Justice Award for Documentary Film at Santa Barbara International Film Festival, Best International Documentary at Real Life on Film Festival, Melbourne and Best Single Documentary, Royal Television Society. In 2007, Sisters In Law won a Peabody Award. [5] It was also nominated for Best British Documentary at the 2005 British Independent Film Awards. [3]
Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reports that 92% of 26 critic reviews were positive, with an average rating of 7.1/10. The website's critics consensus reads, "Enlightening, uplifting, and compelling, Sisters in Law takes an unflinching -- and often humorous -- look at efforts to effect legal progress for Muslim women in Cameroon." [6]
Hirokazu Kore-eda is a Japanese film director, producer, screenwriter, and editor. He began his career in television and has since directed more than a dozen feature films, including Nobody Knows (2004), Still Walking (2008), and After the Storm (2016). He won the Jury Prize at the 2013 Cannes Film Festival for Like Father, Like Son and won the Palme d'Or at the 2018 Cannes Film Festival for Shoplifters.
The 58th Cannes Film Festival started on 11 May and ran until 22 May 2005. Twenty movies from 13 countries were selected to compete. The awards were announced on 21 May, the Palme d'Or went to the Belgian film L'Enfant by the Dardenne brothers.
Im Sang-soo is a South Korean film director and screenwriter. He has twice been invited to compete for the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival, with The Housemaid in 2010 and The Taste of Money in 2012.
Women's cinema primarily describes cinematic works directed by women filmmakers. The works themselves do not have to be stories specifically about women and the target audience can be varied.
Marc Levin is an American independent film producer and director. He is best known for his Brick City TV series, which won the 2010 Peabody award and was nominated for an Emmy for Exceptional Merit in Nonfiction Filmmaking and his dramatic feature film, Slam, which won the Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival and the Caméra d'Or at Cannes in 1998. He also has received three Emmy Awards and the 1997 DuPont-Columbia Award.
Kim Longinotto is a British documentary film maker, well known for making films that highlight the plight of female victims of oppression or discrimination. Longinotto has made more than 20 films, usually featuring inspiring women and girls at their core. Her subjects have included female genital mutilation in Kenya, women standing up to rapists in India, and the story of Salma, an Indian Muslim woman who smuggled poetry out to the world while locked up by her family for decades.
Jeffrey Leib Nettler Zimbalist is an American filmmaker. He has been Academy Award shortlisted, has won a Peabody, a DuPont, and 3 Emmy Awards, with 14 Emmy nominations. He is the owner of film and television production company All Rise Films.
Siân Heder is an American filmmaker who is best known for writing and directing the films Tallulah and CODA. CODA earned Heder an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay. The film also won the Academy Award for Best Picture and the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for Troy Kotsur.
Thérèse Sita-Bella, born Thérèse Bella Mbida, was a Cameroonian film director who became the first woman filmmaker of Africa and Cameroon.
The cinema of Lebanon, according to film critic and historian Roy Armes, is the only other cinema in the Arabic-speaking region, beside Egypt's, that could amount to a national cinema. Cinema in Lebanon has been in existence since the 1920s, and the country has produced more than 500 films.
Abby Ginzberg is an independent documentary film director and producer and founder of Ginzberg Productions. For the past 30 years, Ginzberg has been creating films that tackle discrimination and the legal profession.
Mania Akbari is an Iranian filmmaker, artist, writer and actress whose works explore women's rights, marriage, sexual identity, disease and body image. Her style, in contrast to the long tradition of melodrama in Iranian cinema, is rooted in the visual arts and autobiography. Because of the taboo themes frankly discussed in her films and her opposition to censorship, she is considered one of the most controversial filmmakers in Iran. As an actress, she is best known for playing the lead role in Abbas Kiarostami's Ten (2002).
Ursula Meier is a French-Swiss film director and screenwriter.
Women Make Movies is a non-profit feminist media arts organization based in New York City. Founded by Ariel Dougherty and Sheila Paige with Dolores Bargowski, WMM was first a feminist production collective that emerged from city-wide Women's Liberation meetings in September 1969. They produced four films by 1973. Dougherty and Paige incorporated the organization in March 1972 as a community based workshop to teach film to everyday women. A distribution service was also begun as an earned income program. In the mid-1970s a membership was created that screened and distributed members' work. In the early 1980s focus shifted to concentrate on distribution of independent films by and about women. WMM also provides production assistance to women filmmakers.
Amina Maher is a queer feminist artist, activist, and filmmaker, whose works train her unblinking gaze on the breakdown of family structure, shame culture, and patriarchal myths. Her creative works criticize traditions, media, culture, and norms. Her cinematic activity began as the main actor in Abbas Kiarostami and Mania Akbari´s Ten (2002) nominated for the Palme d'Or at Cannes Film Festival. She was unknowingly filmed in the passenger seat of her mother´s car. Since then, she acted, edited, and has been in films that have been part of festivals such as Cannes Film Festival, British Film Institute, San Sebastián International Film Festival and International Film Festival Rotterdam. Her directorial short films have been internationally well received with +200 festival participations and +50 Awards from festivals such as Ann Arbor Film Festival, TLVFest, Reeling: The Chicago LGBTQ+ International Film Festival, Expresión en Corto International Film Festival and Shorts México, among many others.
Rokhsareh Ghaemmaghami is a Sundance Award-winning Iranian documentary filmmaker who was born in Tehran. She has directed one full-length documentary, four short documentaries and one animated documentary.
Florence Ayisi was born in Kumba in Cameroon on 22 July 1962). She is an academic and filmmaker. Her film Sisters in Law won more than 27 awards and was short-listed for an Academy Award nomination in 2006. She won the UK Film Council Breakthrough Brits Award for Film Talent in 2008. Since 2000 she has taught film at the University of South Wales.
Feras Fayyad is a Syrian film director, producer, and writer. Fayyad best known for his 2017 documentary Last Men in Aleppo and his 2019 documentary The Cave, both films earned him critical acclaim and numerous awards and nominations including two Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature, making him the first Syrian director to be nominated for an Oscar. Fayyad also won an Emmy award for Best Current Affairs Documentary, was nominated for a creative Emmy for best writing and directing, and has received two George Foster Peabody awards and a nomination for Outstanding Directorial Achievement from the Directors Guild of America for his movie The Cave.
Osvalde Lewat is a Cameroonian filmmaker and photographer best known for her sociopolitical documentaries.
The Voice of a Woman (VOW) is an organization founded by Maureen A. Bryan in 2009, as a platform for the works of women filmmakers, artists and thought leaders internationally. The Voice of a Woman Festival, Awards, Talks and Masterclasses are presented each year in London, New York and Cannes.