Touki Bouki | |
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Directed by | Djibril Diop Mambéty |
Written by | Djibril Diop Mambéty |
Starring |
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Cinematography | Pap Samba Sow |
Edited by |
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Music by | |
Production companies |
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Distributed by | World Cinema Foundation |
Release date |
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Running time | 95 minutes |
Country | Senegal |
Language | Wolof |
Budget | $30,000 |
Touki Bouki (pronounced [tukkibukki] , Wolof for The Journey of the Hyena) is a 1973 Senegalese drama film directed by Djibril Diop Mambéty. [2] It was screened at the 1973 Cannes Film Festival [2] [3] and the 8th Moscow International Film Festival. [4]
Touki Bouki was restored in 2008 at Cineteca di Bologna / L'Immagine Ritrovata Laboratory by the World Cinema Foundation. [5] It was selected as the 93rd greatest film of all time by the Sight and Sound Critic's Poll. [6]
Mory, a cowherd who drives a motorcycle mounted with a bull-horned skull, and Anta, a student, meet in Dakar. Alienated and tired of life in Senegal, they dream of going to Paris and come up with different schemes to raise money for the trip. Mory eventually succeeds in stealing the money, and a large amount of clothing, from the household of a wealthy homosexual while the latter is taking a shower. Anta and Mory can finally buy tickets for the ship to France. But their wealthy victim phones the police who begin to tail the duo, and when Anta and Mory board the ship in the Port of Dakar, the loudspeaker summons Mory to see the captain. Upon hearing this, Mory leaves Anta and runs away madly to find his bull-horned motorcycle, only to see that it has been ruined in a crash that nearly killed the rider who had taken it. The ship sails away with Anta but not Mory, who sits next to his hat on the ground, staring disconsolately at his wrecked motorcycle.
Based on his own story and script, Djibril Diop Mambéty made Touki Bouki with a budget of $30,000 – obtained in part from the Senegalese government. Though influenced by French New Wave, Touki Bouki displays a style all its own. Its camerawork and soundtrack have a frenetic rhythm uncharacteristic of most African films – known for their often deliberately slow-paced, linearly evolving narratives. However, it has been asserted that the jump cuts and radical spatial shifts of the film are inspired by African oral traditions. [7] [8] The word "Bouki" in the title refers to a popular folk character, known for causing mischief and cheating his way to what he wants. [9] Through jump cuts, colliding montage, dissonant sonic accompaniment, and the juxtaposition of premodern, pastoral and modern sounds and visual elements, Touki Bouki conveys and grapples with the hybridization of Senegal. [10]
West African cinema contemporaneous with Touki Bouki was primarily financed and distributed by the French Ministry of Cooperation's Bureau du Cinema, which ensured that scripts had to conform to cinematographic standards acceptable to the French Government. Touki Bouki, in contrast, was made without any French financial assistance, allowing Mambéty relatively significant autonomy in production of the film. Mambéty's ready adoption of French New Wave techniques was to a degree motivated by meagre financial resources, circumstances similar to those of the film-makers of the early French New Wave. [9] Narrative and cinematographic techniques associated with the Western genre (known for dehumanizing depictions of Native Americans and minorities) were also subversively utilized by Mambéty in the production of the film. [8]
During the production of Touki Bouki, Mambéty was arrested for participating in anti-racist protests in Rome, and bailed out by lawyers from the Italian Communist Party after appeals from friends such as Bernardo Bertolucci and Sophia Loren. The experience of receiving a request from the Italian Communist Party to compensate them for the legal fees spent in his defence served as an inspiration for a character in his later film, Hyènes. [11]
In 2005, Touki Bouki was released on DVD by Kino Video.
In 2008, the film was restored in 2K by the Cineteca di Bologna/L'Immagine Ritrovata laboratory, in association with the Martin Scorsese-founded World Cinema Project. [13] In 2013, the restoration of the film was released on DVD and Blu-ray by The Criterion Collection, as part of the Martin Scorsese's World Cinema Project box set. [14] In 2021, the Criterion Collection re-issued the film on DVD and Blu-ray as a standalone release. [15]
In 2014, British band Red Snapper released Hyena, an album inspired by Touki Bouki and featuring a cover image from the film.
"inspired by the band's recent soundtrack for cult 70s Senegalese road movie Touki Bouki, the first independent African film which was recently restored by Martin Scorcese and which is first and foremost an afro-funk odyssey in itself. Have toured with the film for a year, playing the soundtrack live to audiences across Europe; themes from the score have been developed and extended to form Hyena." [16]
Wasis Diop is a Senegalese musician of international renown, known for blending traditional Senegalese folk music with modern pop and jazz.
Aminata Sow Fall is a Senegalese-born author. While her native language is Wolof, her books are written in French. She is considered "the first published woman novelist from francophone Black Africa".
Djibril Diop Mambéty was a Senegalese film director, actor, orator, composer and poet. Though he made only five feature films and two short documentary films, they received international acclaim for their original and experimental cinematic technique and non-linear, unconventional narrative style.
Diop, uncommonly spelled Dioup, is a popular Wolof surname in Senegal and Gambia, and may refer to:
The World Cinema Project (WCP), formerly World Cinema Foundation, is a non-profit organization devoted to the preservation and restoration of neglected world cinema, founded by Martin Scorsese.
"Plaisir d'amour" is a classical French love song written in 1784 by Jean-Paul-Égide Martini (1741–1816); it took its text from a poem by Jean-Pierre Claris de Florian (1755–1794), which appears in his novel Célestine.
Ben Diogaye Bèye is a Senegalese filmwriter, filmmaker, film producer and journalist. He was the assistant director of nearly a dozen Senegalese films, including Touki Bouki with Djibril Diop Mambety, Baks with Momar Thiam, Sarah et Marjama with Axel Lohman, and the co-screenwriter of the latter two.
The cinema of Senegal is a relatively small film industry which experienced its prime from the 1960s through to the early 1980s, but has since declined to less than five feature films produced in the last ten years. Senegal is the capital of African cinema and the most important place of African film production after its independence from France in 1960.
Senegalese literature is written or literary work which has been produced by writers born in the West African state. Senegalese literary works are mostly written in French, the language of the colonial administration. However, there are many instances of works being written in Arabic and the native languages of Wolof, Pulaar, Mandinka, Diola, Soninke and Serer. Oral traditions, in the form of Griot storytellers, constitute a historical element of the Senegalese canon and have persisted as cultural custodians throughout the nation's history. A form of proto-Senegalese literature arose during the mid 19th century with the works of David Abbé Boilat, who produced written ethnographic literature which supported French Colonial rule. This genre of Senegalese literature continued to expand during the 1920s with the works of Bakary Diallo and Ahmadou Mapaté Diagne. Earlier literary examples exist in the form of Qur’anic texts which led to the growth of a form African linguistic expressionism using the Arabic alphabet, known as Ajami. Poets of this genre include Ahmad Ayan Sih and Dhu al-nun.
Twenty Years of African Cinema is a 1983 Tunisian documentary film directed by Férid Boughedir.
Hyenas is a 1992 Senegalese film adaptation of Friedrich Dürrenmatt's Swiss-German satirical tragicomedy play The Visit (1956), directed by Djibril Diop Mambéty. The intimate story of love and revenge parallels a critique of neocolonialism and African consumerism. It was entered into the 1992 Cannes Film Festival.
La Petite Vendeuse de Soleil is a 1999 Senegalese drama film, directed by Djibril Diop Mambéty which premiered after his death in 1998.
Badou Boy is a 1970 Senegalese film, directed by Djibril Diop Mambéty. The film follows the adventures of Badou Boy, a cheeky young man, as he travels through the streets of Dakar on the city buses.
The Cineteca di Bologna is a film archive in Bologna, Italy. It was founded on 18 May 1962.
Contras'city is a Senegalese 1968 short documentary film.
Parlons Grand-mère is a Senegalese 1989 short documentary film.
The 8th Moscow International Film Festival was held from 10 to 23 July 1973. The Golden Prizes were awarded to the Soviet film That Sweet Word: Liberty! directed by Vytautas Žalakevičius and the Bulgarian film Affection directed by Ludmil Staikov.
Trances is a 1981 documentary film about the influential Moroccan avant-pop band Nass El Ghiwane. It was shot, written, and directed by Ahmed El Maânouni.
Mati Diop is a French film director and actress. She won the Grand Prix at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival for her feature film debut, the supernatural romantic drama Atlantics, and the Golden Bear at the 2024 Berlin International Film Festival for her second feature film, the documentary Dahomey. As an actress, she is known for the drama film 35 Shots of Rum (2008).
Moussa Bathily is a Senegalese history teacher, journalist, film director and producer, screen writer, and novelist.
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