Frank N. Ukadike,
Questioning African Cinema: Questioning African Filmmakers.
Minneapolis, London: University of Minnesota Press, 2002.
ISBN 0 8166 4005 X US$19.95 (pb)
ISBN 0-8166-4004-1 US$59.95 (hb)
304pp
(Review copy supplied by University of Minnesota Press)

The greatest injustice is not the one we think; the greatest injustice is the one that people create by remaining in a state of ignorance. (In Chef! by Jean-Marie Teno) [1]

A perusal of the quantity of literature produced in the USA since the nineties could lead us to consider that the studies of African cinema have experienced a great development in English-speaking worlds. A recent book by Nwachukwu Frank Ukadike is there to remind us, unwillingly however, that this huge editorial activity could, on the contrary, also hide the genuine situation of African cinema as a field of research in the humanities and/or social sciences. The intention of this author is to deal with a very complex issue – African cinema in general or African cinema as what he provocatively calls a “notion” – saying things that one would not be used to say or hear about African cinema. In the introduction to his book, Ukadike warns us that he intends to deal with “(…) the contentious issues that academic writing often finds too challenging or too controversial to explore”(xix). After a short overview, one can affirm that this task has been accomplished: African filmmakers tell readers about their angers, desires, failures and other personal difficulties. However, if these were the only objectives, there would not be much to say in favour or against them; it would depend on the ideological orientation of the reader. In fact, since we are not actually reading completely authored writings – except for the introduction and questions asked – but interviews with African filmmakers conducted by Ukadike over several years, the work of commentary has become an uneasy task, which constitutes a problem in itself. The question thus raised is to whom is this text addressed and what kind of debate can it create? My interpretation is that Ukadike prefers controversy over debate.

Things become even more difficult as Ukadike does not limit his ambition to this but determines his main objective: addressing his publication to one type of audience, “those who stand against injustice”.[2] From this perspective, the work of commentary and assessment becomes complicated although unavoidable: beyond the “stylistic exploration” and the provocative words, the author has the ambition to definitively tell us about something important and relevant for the study of African cinema. However, on the contrary such an endeavour is just an impossible thing to achieve, with the best intentions of the world, unless there are criteria which allow re-linking the discourse on African cinema to some “human matters”. In addition, this perspective also provides criticism of most of Ukadike’s assumptions, some being related to Ukadike’s approach to African cinema, others being radically opposed to his ideological orientation with their highly destructive consequences. My criticism will necessarily have to go beyond the very textuality of interviews so that one can approach the ideological and economic conditions, which have brought it, somehow, into existence. On the whole, this book could be taken as an occasion to remember that the discourse of African cinema must be distinguished from an arbitrary discourse on those cinemas and that this persistent mistake should urge cinephiles to go back to the works of the African filmmakers themselves.

Text of the interviews

The subtitle of Ukadike’s book reminds us that rather than questioning African cinema it actually is African filmmakers the author is interviewing. Since this practice of interviews has always been a constant practice in the studies of African cinema, [3]  Ukadike’s book is a development in a relatively long tradition. I will classify the twenty interviews into three categories: first, there are several interviews in which new information appeared in spite of the ideological orientation of the interviewer; a second category offers a majority of interviews which can occasionally be interesting but which are often accompanied by a problematic ideology; last there are interviews from which nothing new emerges as well as interviews where the ugly words of extremism appear. This “classification” may be considered as arising from the personal judgment of a white Frenchman. However, the point here is not related to the specificity or the interest of each of these interviews but to be able to evaluate, by mutual comparison, these interviews altogether since Ukadike claims to provide a kind of global image of African cinema by gathering them here.

To begin with, the interview with Med Hondo brings much valuable information, which, in this case, is sufficiently intimate and personal to reveal an existential dimension to filmmaking practice. Hondo is well known for his strong conflicts with certain French institutions but here these problems are almost left in the background. The interview with Lionel Ngakane could be considered within the same perspective, as one does not have much opportunity to hear from this pioneer and doyen of South African cinema. Apart from questions related to exoticism (after those on the representation of nudity and sexuality), Ngakane not only follows the anti-French orientation of Ukadike’s discourse but contradicts his interlocutor. The discussion with Mweze Ngangura has the potential to be as important as those with Hondo and Ngakane. The Congolese filmmaker often provides long and detailed answers to Ukadike’s questions, which are more open. Among the most interesting developments are those related to the relationships between Belgium and Congo, the situation of the diasporas, and the question of “identity”. While quite rare in the literature on African cinema, the interview with King Ampaw reveals a personality which stands firm in the face of Ukadike’s tendentious questions. His answers to questions on “foreign influences”, the presence of the media, and co-productions are particularly remarkable. King Ampaw is a friend of Werner Herzog; he has played in Cobra verde, a film that he has always defended. When Ukadike asks: “Do you think there is a need for an African film language?”, his response is:

As far as film is concerned, there is no need for a European film language, so there is no need for an African film language. There is only one film language. If you tell me that there can be an African cinematography in the storytelling, I will agree with you. But you cannot tell me there is a specific language for an African film. I will never agree with that. What I am trying to say is that there is only one universal film language. We know our close-ups, our medium shots, and our long shots. It is these shots that we put together to construct the film language. There is no African film language! There is only one film language, and that is the camera language! (216)

Although this concept of a “film language” can bring more problems than solutions to film studies, this reminder by Ampaw about the “universality” of a medium called “camera” could become the genuine beginning of a discussion on African cinema: it actually constitutes the end of Ukadike’s interview. The conversations with Mekuria, a relatively unknown filmmaker, and with Jean-Marie Teno, a prolific young filmmaker from Cameroon, [4]  can be considered from the same perspective. If Ukadike does not seem to give an ideological direction to the interview with Salem Mekuria while tackling issues such as feminism, one feels there is an attempt to do so in a question such as “is there a dichotomy between African and Western feminism?” At the same time, Mekuria offers important statements on the role of criticism for the development of African cinema. The interview with Teno represents a literal and direct contradiction to what appears to be Ukadike’s ideology. [5] On the other hand, the interview with Chief Eddie Ugbomah, a veteran of Nigerian cinema does not seem to participate in this game, in particular on the relation between politics and aesthetics in practices that are largely directed and moved by the need for entertainment. When Ukadike asks his usual question about French support to cinema to evoke a kind of dependence and acculturation, Ugbomah limits his reply to a description of the difficulties of Nigerian directors.

Most of Ukadike’s conversations with African filmmakers lack the density and dialogical dimension found within this first group where most of the interviewees were able to contest the views of their interlocutor. Generally, the reader now has to deal with many contradictions and complicated or incomplete views – beyond the fact that Ukadike did warn us about the difficulties of his project. [6] For example, while providing a lot of information concerning Nigeria and the “personality” of the Nigerian film industry, one wonders why he interviews Brendan Shehu[7]  since the objective stated by Ukadike in his introduction was to choose a representative panel among African directors. This interview belongs to the group of problematic interviews – negative perception of the Francophone and non-Nigerian worlds, issues of the representation of women and sexuality, and/or ethnographic cinema. The interview with the Malian filmmaker Cheick Oumar Sissoko can also be considered from this perspective. First, he seems to have the opportunity to develop his views, which are in constant evolution thanks to the dynamism of this author who recently became Minister of Culture in Mali. However, during certain developments of the discussion – symptomatically, regarding the topic of excision or the usual contradictions between issues of European financial aid and of African discourse on identity – Sissoko also seems to fall into the “traps” set by Ukadike. Secondly, sometimes Ukadike leads the interviewee into contradicting himself. Kwaw Ansah, for example, makes the point: “Don’t forget that we in the English-speaking African countries are not as lucky as our brothers in the French-speaking African countries, whose former colonial master created a film-supporting mechanism from which filmmakers can source funding for a film idea (so long as the idea is nonpolitical against the former master).”(17) Earlier, however, he argued that: “I must say that we in the Anglophone countries must be blessed for not having received such ‘gracious’ support from our colonial master! “(6) The interview with Ramadan Suleman, an emerging South African director, though quite interesting, largely confirms Ukadike’s opinion, particularly its anti-French stance. Although he mentions that extremist ideology must be avoided in the field of African cinema, [8] a clear consciousness of the danger related to the current discourse on “africanity” does not seem to appear.

A lack of methodology is evident in Ukadike’s approach to interviewing. In his discussion with Safi Faye, Ukadike avoids issues that he addressed previously. This in spite of the fact that they directly concern a woman and a director from Senegal who used to work with Jean Rouch: issues of representation of women or ethnographic cinema. [9] In the same way, contradictions can be perceived in the discussion with Gaston Kaboré, notably between Ukadike’s presentation of this filmmaker from Burkina Faso and his statement elsewhere concerning Francophone African countries. Why doesn’t Ukadike ask the same questions as to other Anglophone filmmakers regarding roughly the so-called “French imperialism”? Questions on Fespaco, for example, appear to be particularly tame compared to the discussions with Anglophone African filmmakers on this topic.

Under those circumstances, the last situation that Ukadike unsurprisingly faces is non-conversation. The interview with the Cameroonian director Jean-Pierre Bekolo constitutes the first case of this. Ukadike seems non-responsive, unless he is destabilized by Bekolo’s discourse. Bekolo speaks in a quite brilliant way; however, he often presents signs of self-contradiction. While primarily motivated to express his originality or some provocative points of view, Bekolo’s discourse is sometimes confused and not particularly original: the discourse on victimisation remains. The second case is the interview with Cissé. It seems to be one comprising tensions and misunderstandings, arising from Ukadike’s ideological perspective. For instance, questions regarding Yeelen are frozen. At first Ukadike presents the position of other critics on Yeelen and Cissé disagrees; then, he says that he would like to clarify misconceptions about the film without going any further in that direction – film analysis is completely absent from Ukadike’s book. He was certainly blocked by Cissé’s position but was he able to clarify the debate as he pretended to? Was he able to ask questions regarding the problem he wanted to evoke, questions which Cissé might be able to answer? One can wonder if what is at stake here involves his knowledge of interview techniques about the cinema of the Malian filmmaker. [10]

Beyond the interesting and difficult interviews, there are a number that misfire or are misdirected. In the case of Flora Gomes, for instance, after saying “we cannot make films with subsidises. There is a will of French authorities to help Africa, but until when?”, this great director from Guinea-Bissau does not provide any evidence of the uselessness of an event like Fespaco and of the involvement of the Francophone world. [11] Later, the Senegalese filmmaker Djibril Diop Mambety[12]  mentions that he would rather speak about films than of African cinema in general and the discussion is not very long. The interview with Idrissa Ouedraogo does not go very far either. Ukadike evokes the shift in his cinema from “ethnographic films” to “entertainment movies”; however, apart from the issues related to actors, Ukadike’s questions and therefore Ouedraogo’s answers are not developed further. Yet, the filmography of Idrissa Ouedraogo is one of the most impressive among African filmmakers. All of this would have necessitated another treatment by Ukadike – whose first questions were inevitably related to the relationships between Ouedraogo and France. On 8 pages of interview, a large section concerns Kini and Adams, which is a minor production by Ouedraogo. Finally, as a kind of negative correspondent to this lack, there are also two long interviews, in which Ukadike expresses his total sympathy and admiration with his interlocutors and from which emerge a perfectly delirious, demagogic and eventually racialist statement on the French, “mixed people” and the “white man” in general. [13]

The rhetoric of africanity

Beyond these interviews, it is necessary to come back to the author’s objective. There are two parts of Ukadike’s book that can be directly related to his personal thought: the questions asked of African filmmakers and the introduction. Since most of the problems about these interviews have been mentioned, another step for an in-depth reading is to analyse the introduction. In focusing on the form and content of the interviews, some of Ukadike’s ideological orientation has already been noted. First, the interviews, as analysed previously, reveal numerous problematic points and, secondly, it must be recalled that a conversation involves several people, two at least: the question must be raised whether all or none of these people are the authors. Ukadike claims that these interviews are the result of his own work and can then achieve the different aims prescribed in the introduction to his book. This is the onus that allows the deconstruction of the rhetorical stance since it makes the reader believe there may be a rational and concrete link between the semantics of this introduction and the possible goals.

Ukadike emphasizes the “notion of African cinema” in the first paragraph of the introduction. From this first paragraph, he simultaneously reveals his high ambitions and the undetermined goals of his research. There is a contradiction between this concept of African cinema as a “notion” and the fact that this notion is, in Ukadike’s texts themselves, overwhelmed by a multiplicity of factors within which one can see neither Ukadike’s point of view nor the methodology he uses in order to approach these African cinemas and/or the notion that unifies them. I am implying here a methodology that can occasionally fill in for the lack of structure of the work involving an approach of these “specific socio-political, cultural, economic, and pedagogical issues that influences the production, reception, and discourse of films while at the same time serving as a compendium of “alternative” approaches in African cinematic trends.”(xvii) Interviews are by no means a methodology; at best, they can be used to collect data on African filmmakers and their practices. At this first level, it is mainly the relation to film studies that is in question, which in turn affects the approach to African cinema.

In the third paragraph of his introduction, Ukadike puts together almost all of the other issues that may extend the “notion” of African cinema as such (or that may be specific issues within this “notion”) and his personal ideology about African filmmaking. From the beginning, he mentions that his book will deal with “foreground acting, distribution and exhibition, history, theory and criticism, video-based television production, and television’s relationship to independent film”(xvii). What would then appear is his description of “the evolution of African cinema, the ambiguities of ethnographic films, and the politics and problems of seeing Africa through African lenses.” (xvii) Such a program would already be most ambitious in itself. However, as previously, one cannot find any more conceptual structure in this extension of the field of research. When Ukadike adds that his “overall goal is to offer the most comprehensive discussion to date of African filmmakers and the cinematic trends they have initiated”(xvii) it is hard not to interpret this sentence as a kind of (unconscious) confession that he has to hide the failure of his huge ambitions behind the mass of information provided by unstructured and demagogic interviews. After reading all of his conversations with twenty filmmakers from eleven African countries, one can easily acknowledge the diversity of all these practices and experiences and think that issues such as those mentioned in Ukadike’s introduction have been met and identified. Yet, in doing so, one would be in a situation where most of the objectives that Ukadike assigned to his work would have already been forgotten: demonstrate the unity of filmmaking practices in Africa and so of African cinema as a notion. How does one deny any longer that this is due to the lack of structure of this “approach” of African cinema as well as to the disproportionate ambitions attached to it?

I will relate the contradictory and confused views of Ukadike, on the other hand, to his description of the history of African cinema and, on the other hand, to what he considers an “African film language”. Regarding the “history of African cinema”, Ukadike surely recognizes the diversity of African cinema as well as the fact that filmmaking practices initiated by the youngest generation of African filmmakers differ from the mainly didactic and even political approach of the first and second generations of African filmmakers. However, he still tries to present a unified history of all these different filmmaking practices while saying at the same time that “the younger directors break the mould of traditional paradigm”… Regarding a so-called “African film language”, Ukadike argues the following:

As a whole, this book addresses the impact of politics on film styles and on video and television culture, while reciprocally delineating the role of cultural codes of cinematic expression in patterns of signification. The discourse also traces African cinema’s preoccupation with culture and history, its influence on various aesthetic developments, and the widening scope of African cinematic representational patterns. It is here that the discourse conceptualizes what really constitutes African film language.

After saying this, as an issue related to the history of these practices, the following sentences deal with the question of knowing if there is “a unified stance on narrative strategies among African filmmakers”, whereas the first problem would be to know how one could jump from this issue of a “discourse” related to African filmmaking practices to the notion of an “African film language”. In both sides of narrative practices – the “external” narratives produced by historians as well as the “internal” narratives produced by filmmakers – there is a clear contradiction that remains unresolved in Ukadike’s introduction as well as, obviously, in his interviews with African filmmakers. Facing this deadlock that results from this contradiction between the diversity of practices and discourses and the forced will to find an achieved unity to all of these practices and discourses, the strategy of Ukadike at the end of this paragraph unsurprisingly is to escape by arguing the “inadequacy of contemporary critical methodologies for dealing with African cinema”. Although it is now well known that new approaches to African cinema must be devised – within the framework of rigorous epistemology however – this last sentence seems to present someone who blames his field of research for the flaws in his analysis.

The limits and failures of practices such as interviews have already been mentioned. Now, beyond all of these, the re-reading of Ukadike’s introduction allows one to see that the only tool he has to justify his ability to discuss African cinema is that he is himself an African. He says that his interviews can offer another experience of African cinema by providing “multicultural, multi-ideological, synchronic and diachronic views of African cinema”. The problem related to Ukadike’s view of African cinema as a “notion” with its multiple factors is perpetuated and reinforced – although differently – by the will to tell simultaneously about “the common bond, geographically, historically, socially, or politically” of varied filmmaking practices and about the “individual achievement against the backdrop of the often complex historical, social, political, economic, and state practices that affect the production of films in Africa”(xvii). At this level, one may finally deal with one of the main ideological premises of Ukadike’s discourse: the victimization of African filmmakers and filmmaking as they can, simultaneously, be linked to one common soil, culture, people and be victims of foreign and African policies over this soil, culture and people. There can be no doubt that the “notion” which encloses this “commonality” will be a concept of race. Far from the study of films released by Africans directors throughout the continent, it is the “africanity” of these filmmakers that Ukadike’s approach is interested in. He has thus elaborated an essentialist definition of African cinema, whenever any definition of African cinema could be produced and with all the problems related to essentialism.

The lost sense of commentary

The practice of commentary has to be linked to the objects to which it is attached. These objects, films and the cinema, are the missing items of the book. True, contemporary film studies have recalled that they are related to numerous external parameters. Whenever this is mentioned by Ukadike, it is not clarified in relation to African contexts and history; on the contrary, it sometimes appears as a pretext to the development of a limitless discussion on politics (e.g. French actions in favour of African cinema etc.), cultural relativism (e.g. representation of women and sexuality etc.), with the agreement of interviewed people whenever possible. This situation of the cinema amid different media and cultural activities has generally contributed to its popular appeal as well as to a certain cultural prestige. Film studies has, nevertheless, always provided relevant methodologies in order to understand these complexities for themselves as well as in relation to its context(s). All of the studies seriously involved with African cinema have shown (sometimes unwillingly) that we are dealing with practices and objects that are different to those from the “West” (and some other parts of the world) while using the same technologies and depending (almost) on the same financial needs as non-standard cinemas throughout the world. The recognition of this situation by scholars constitutes a question in itself; at the same time, the question of the specificity of African cinema remains. I mean that one could find a key to understand the deadlock, which leads Ukadike’s discourse in this seeming contradiction between the definition of the differences in African cinema, on the one hand, and the limit of the assignment of such difference, on the other hand.

The discourse on the African cinema – just like the African cinema itself – has been developed around the idea of a “cinematic specificity” which would be at the origin of these practices. This specificity was generally reported as a common reference to a Pan-African ideology as well as to various third-world oriented discourses. From now on, when one speaks about the discourse of the African cinema, it is primarily an ideological discourse that is being discussed. These two main references – Pan-Africanism and Third Worldism – however, should not be considered indistinctly; in fact, they did not experience the same evolution, while being sometimes associated. Pan-Africanism generally leads to a discourse on identity – without giving, at this level, a derogatory sense to it: one may find there such ideas as “Black Consciousness”, and”Cultural Unity of Africa”. Alongside this, the Third Worldism, or more exactly Third Worldisms, are clearly related to the Marxist conception of a historical materialism and thus built-in links between Africans and non-Africans. While emphasizing a way beyond a certain essentialism of the Pan-Africanist ideology, Third Worldism remains, however, an anti-humanistic discourse: the source and the solution of the problems of Africa are within the ideological framework of the relationship between the political field and the socio-economic field, in the relationship between social infrastructure and capitalistic superstructure, which overflows the framework of a human control and always returns, in the last analysis, to the area of ideology.

Having quite closely followed the evolution of African cinema, various commentators have endeavoured to return to an account of this specificity in relation to the topic of ideology. Without inviting the responsibility of these first commentators, the consequence of this ideological approach is to have indirectly allowed others to take for granted that one can not only speak but must speak about this ideological discourse of African cinema, as examples the messages which they would have to distil, at the expense of research on the historical, anthropological or aesthetic levels of these cinemas. From this point of view, Ukadike’s book can constitute an occasion to point out the risk for most of the studies on African cinema to be sent to the margin of “traditional” film studies – which generally focuses on Western cinemas – or, at least, perpetuates a kind of academic underdevelopment when one compares them to the evolution of these “traditional” film studies.

The problem concerning the ideological discourse of African cinema therefore begins when the “ideological” evolution of these cinemas is not accompanied by an “ideological” evolution of the commentaries on these cinemas. Far from going in that direction, one must note on the contrary an ideological tightening of some of these commentaries. I am refering here to the establishment, since the Eighties, of the ‘Third Cinema’ theory and in particular to its application to African cinema. We are not concerned here with certain contributions of Marxist criticism – which can partly be felt in the Third Cinema theory – but the schematic view, the finalism, and eventually the over-simplification of a theory, which does not maintain a concrete relation with films and cinematic practices. In this direction, the interpretative work of a commentator ceases to exist, in particular in some literature produced in the US. As is clearly the case with Ukadike’s book, one reaches a point where this “research” towards African cinema is transformed into a “discourse” on what these cinemas should be, not on what they actually are or on their future in connection with a history, which would have been clarified. In addition to that, this “discourse” becomes quite opaque due to the omnipresence of the commentator producing it.

How has such a situation become prevalent? American publications have been at the forefront in that direction – and tend to be influential worldwide. Ukadike makes mention of two of these works in his introduction, the “only” two that are putting forward the African or Afro-American identity of their authors: Manthia Diawara’s African Cinema published by Indiana University Press in 1992 and Frank N. Ukadike’s own Black African Cinema published by University of California Press in 1994. It is remarkable that a lot of these works extend the research carried out by African and European authors between the Sixties and Eighties (for example, Paulin Soumanou Vieyra, Pierre Haffner) but are not recognized as doing so. At the same time, Non-American research on African films has essentially appeared through articles. One can also mention here the creation of newspapers or associations often in direct connection with concrete aspects of African cinema. From this point of view, one must admit that they had and have got a much more pragmatic agenda. Even though “the ideology” remains – how could it be different? – its direction and contents are completely ignored by Ukadike. On the other hand, the commentaries produced in the US remained more or less on a nearly immutable ideological base, taking in stride the Pan-African quest or, to use a more recent expression, an Afro-centrist identity as well as the third-world re-appropriation of the means of production and autonomy. Admittedly these topics continued to exist in other authors and, generally speaking, most commentators still have to confront them. However, certain authors deal with it through, somehow, fixed conceptions. In Ukadike’s book, this problem appears in its conception of an identity and of African values, in its conception of an anthropological thought, and more generally in its rejection of any partnership with Europe (and in particular with France) at various stages of the production, distribution or diffusion. Yet, the reality of African cinema is that the link with anthropological thought not only remains but has been reinforced, changing the nature of this link, which has been considered impure since Ousmane Sembène. The partnership with Europe and other countries of goodwill – the US excepted since they don’t financially contribute – has furthermore also been reinforced in the same way as all the other non-standard cinemas throughout the world have been. [14]

Although the criticism that one will sum up as “African” or “European” does exist in and around African cinema, Afro-centrist criticism produced in the US – to use the distinction established by Walter Benjamin between criticism and commentary[15] – seems to hesitate between the stiff air of libraries trying to record all that has been published in this field and the academic desultoriness of literary laissez-aller. It is even possible to read Ukadike’s work from the point of view of Georges Steiner’s warning against the surfeit of commentaries which characterize our time, or against the lost sense of commentary made thanks to a genuine experience with the works of artists, and finally against a certain destruction of language that results from the assimilation of the journalistic. [16] Steiner referred directly to Karl Kraus concerning this last issue. A parallel could also be established with Walter Benjamin[17]  in order to circumvent a certain cultural conservatism in Steiner, in particular in the predominance given to literary work at the expense of other arts such as cinema.

One could also consider that this “destruction” or “radical questioning” would precisely be Ukadike’s objective. On the contrary, Ukadike does not deny that these types of cinema do exist: a vexed position that could sometimes be a by-product of traditional film studies, which is often tainted with touches of Euro-centrism or US-centrism. [18] We are now reaching the ultimate contradiction of Ukadike’s work: its approach or commentary on African cinema cannot be evaluated on the altar of critical activity, with its internal criteria of validity – experience of films, determination of author intentions, self-criticism etc. – but in relation to an economic and institutional context – academic publishing policies – which, on the one hand, squeezes scholars to publish as much as possible, and, on the other hand, facilitates the massive production of these publications (the “publish-or-perish” logic). My criticism also blames a censorship or a self-censorship related to this economic and institutional context which, under the pressure of political correctness, has abandoned any practice of criticism. In this sense Ukadike’s work, regardless of its ideological orientation but taking into account its defaults, could only be published in the US. In fact, other aspects of this book, such as the list of African film distributors in the United States, reinforce this idea of a book strictly for American use, although its topic is African and concerns an international readership.

This institutional situation, with the problems it creates for the traditionalists (such as George Steiner) as well as to publications tending to be radical (as is the case with Ukadike’s work), has been quite brilliantly summed up by Jürgen Habermas with regards to the issue of political correctness in Charles Taylor’s The Politics of Recognition. [19]

In the debate about political correctness these phenomena served as an occasion for American intellectuals to engage in a process of self-reflection about the status of modernity. Neither party to the debate wants to pursue the project of modernity on its own terms, as a project that should not be abandoned. What the “radicals” see as an encouraging step into post-modernity and toward overcoming totalising figures of thought is for the “traditionalists” the sign of a crisis that can be dealt with only through a return to the classical traditions of the West. We can leave this debate aside, since it contributes little to an analysis of struggles for recognition in the democratic constitutional state and virtually nothing to their political resolution. [20]

Even the reference to Gilles Deleuze (in the foreword) could be considered as fallacious and incomplete. [21]  Indubitably the French philosopher could be set among the radicals for he has inspired contemporary discourses on post-modernity. However, it must be recalled that this important but also difficult author is often not read and understood properly by scholars who tend to use his many interests from a partial point of view. Deleuze’s approach to African cinema is therefore primarily related to Jean Rouch as much as to Sembène Ousmane. Furthermore, and perhaps more importantly, his strong criticism of capitalism[22] is perfectly incompatible with Ukadike’s fascination or link with certain hollywoodian practices (as well as “bollywoodian” ones).

Conclusion

During and after reading Ukadike’s book, one wonders what can interviews accomplish? There is a necessary difference between the orality of the discussions with the filmmakers and Ukadike’s written data, edited interviews. Readers may take everything said seriously, maybe more seriously than is meant by some of the contributing parties. However what else can one do with something that presents itself as a book? We might have at this level a first idea of the intrinsic dilemma from which this work seems not to be able to escape: on the one hand, there is a legitimate affiliation or a possible linkage with an African approach to African cinema; on the other hand, the question of the status of these filmmakers’ speeches remains. Indeed, it is obvious that a single interview cannot explain the complete thought of a filmmaker or the discourse of African cinema. One needs numerous conversations, taken in different times and places. Ukadike evokes the fact that he has already had other or previous conversations with some filmmakers. In fact, anyone who is interested in African films and filmmakers should try to diminish any risk of misunderstanding by reading as many interviews as possible.

Two kinds of reception may await Ukadike’s book. A naïve and wide reception could appreciate the diversity and wealth of discourses made about African cinema and consider that it is a legitimate way to show this diversity and wealth. A more informed and lucid reception would find a lack of structure in the technique of interviews, leading to serious contradictions within the interviews – regardless of the contradiction of the replies made by filmmakers – and finally an ideological and tendentious orientation in the process of the interviews. I favour the second approach as well as a strong resistance and criticism to the “racial” ideology that subsumes many of their aspects. Regardless, one does not know much more about the discourse that is supposedly at stake here, especially through the interview form. Do we have to recall that, with very few exceptions, all of those interviewed by Ukadike have already been interviewed many times elsewhere?

Four recurrent issues can be pointed out in the “discourse” that Ukadike is trying to develop. The issue of “identity” is the first one. The reading of Ukadike’s book often gives the feeling of a wrong or absent relationship to time and history, in the sense that he completely ignores men and women who are not “Black” but did work for the African independences or political liberations, not only on a political level but in the cultural domain to which cinema is institutionally attached. From this perspective, his conception of an identity appears clearly as essentialist. The theme of an opposition between the Anglophone and the Francophone worlds is a second important issue of Ukadike’s book. It implies a great ignorance of the Francophone cultures in numerous parts of the interviews. How could he explain for instance that the French have funded anti-colonial films by Sembène Ousmane as well as a number of productions critical of French policies in Africa? As evoked by Ukadike, this cultural attitude is related to both the culture and the cultural politics of France, which means that there is culturally a minimal distinction to establish between politics – and its dependency on economic outbursts – and culture.

Ukadike does not mention these French and Francophone conceptions of cultural matters, [23] although they inextricably belong to the field of African film studies. A French or European author would make it his duty to inquire about Nigerian popular arts in the context of Yoruba cultural syncretism and conservatism described by Nigerians and experts. The third main issue of Ukadike’s book is related to the representation of women and sexuality in African cinema: Ukadike’s ideological position has been sufficiently reported previously; it could be recalled here that a “reactionary” position regarding this issue is often hidden by a fallacious reference to a form of cultural relativism. Finally, a fourth issue is related to the question of the audience a filmmaker is addressing in his films, on the one hand and, on the other hand, in the interviews about his films or their reception by others. African cinema is still a minor activity in Sub-Saharan Africa not only on a cultural and economic level but also on a “symbolic” one. Within this perspective, the negativity as expressed by Ukadike, which mainly leads to the victimization of African filmmakers, is irrelevant. One strategy against this conception will remain, first, to oppose history to identity; second, to recall the cultural specificity of Francophone areas and their contribution to a “métissage” culture worldwide; third, to allow the greatest development of female filmmakers and female approaches to African cinema; and eventually to break with this ideology of victimisation, notably in its contradiction regarding the financial dimension of the cinema in Sub-Saharan Africa.

Samuel Lelièvre
University of Natal, Durban, South Africa

Endnotes

[1] Les Films du Raphia, Cameroon / France / Germany, 1999.
[2] This is the epitaph of Ukadike’s book.
[3] In order to provide further information about these practices, and about the filmakers’ intentions etc.
[4] Ukadike does not mention, however, the relatively voluminous filmography of Jean-Marie who was born in 1966.
[5] Such as represented by the question “(…) this white woman plays a dominating role in an African becoming politically conscious. Isn’t the film alluding to the fact that someone has to remind Africans to wake up and deal with to their problems?” Ukadike, idem, p. 305. Same thing regarding the French influences over the Fespaco, Ukadike, idem, p.313-14. One finds an interesting development of Teno on the “métissage” in which any concept of identity is eliminated, Ukadike,idem, p.311. Teno also expresses his scepticism towards Nigerian audio-visual facilities.
[6] Starting with the bad opinion of certain African filmmakers towards scholars studying or “teaching” African films.
[7] Brendan Shehu has directed only two films, one in 1968, the other in 1992.
[8] There is an interesting remark on the idea that any film has never contributed to revolution. It must be recalled that films of Ramadan Suleman are supported by French and European fundings (which is rarely the case of other South African filmmakers)
[9] The following statement, for instance, remains most superficial: “You are a member of the village so you are looking from inside as opposed to other people who look from the outside, at what they call “exotic cultures”. That is the difference that separates your films from, for example, the films of Jean Rouch”. Ukadike, idem, p.31.
[10] The following sentence by Cissé should be meditated with regards to the ideological orientation of Ukadike’s book: “Let us hope that there is reconciliation around the whole planet and that people of all races would pay less attention to what races they belong so that man emerges victorious”, in Ukadike, idem, p. 25.
[11] “Mortu Nega was shown at Fespaco. How was it received and what is your impression of Fespaco?” Gomes’s reply: “The reaction when Mortu Nega was shown in Fespaco was a total surprise. One has to remember that Fespaco is the cinematographic event in black Africa. When I finished Mortu Nega, I wanted to just drop everything. I never thought I would find the energy within me to make another film. When the film went to Fespaco, the response of the audience in Ouagadougou was so wonderful it just inspired me to do something else for this public that I love so much.”
[12] To which Ukadike would like to pay tribute by dedicating this chapter of the book.
[13] Out of principle, I will not reproduce here the content of all of these discourses. The reader will have to consult directly interviews with Gaballa Gubara and Haile Gerima.
[14] Ukadike actually adds more objectives to his work: “examines thematic diversity, stylistic configuration, the role of cultural codes in patterns of signification, and all contextual factors hindering development as well as various accomplishments”, idem.
[15] Mainly since his essay on Goethe’s Ellective Affinities, in Sens Unique, (Paris: Les Lettres Nouvelles, 1978).
[16] Georges Steiner, Réelles présences. Les arts du sens, (Paris: Gallimard, 1989).
[17] “The originality of the Benjamin’s conception of literary criticism holds as much as for what it affirms than for what it eliminates: traditional academic criticism, orthodox Marxist criticism and the “feuilletonism” so widespread under the Weimar Republic – and everywhere in Europe -, from there stand the privileged relationships which linked him to the re-foundation of criticism as a Genre by the Romantics and the work of Karl Kraus “(…)” the refusal of “literary journalism”, limited in supplying information of the reader, limited to the actuality, were also denounced by Karl Kraus in Vienna. The theses on literary criticism that Sens Unique states are inseparable from the “Tombeau pour Karl Kraus”. What the “feuilletonism” endangers is not only the truth of the work, but language itself.” [my translation], Jean-Michel Palmier, “La recréation de la critique littéraire comme genre philosophique chez Walter Benjamin”, in A propos de la Critique, D. Chateau (ed.), (Paris: L’Harmattan, 1995), pp.76-77.
[18] We are far from the discussions that are currently taking place in film studies – to which African films studies belong even so -, mainly between the partisan of a definition of this discipline as an open field in the crossroad of different disciplines (from Humanities to Social Sciences) and the partisan of a kind of disciplinary independance under the leadership of the American Tradition of Esthetics.
[19] Charles Taylor, Multiculturalism: Examining the Politics of Recognition, edited by Amy Gutmann, (Princeton University Press, 1994), pp.25-73.
[20] Jürgen Habermas, “Struggles for Recognition in the Democratic Constitutional State”, in idem, p.120.
[21] One could accept this reference to Deleuze in this paragraph of the book (p.x) and advise, at the same time, to read rather the development made in this perspective by Dudley Andrew in “The Roots of The Nomadic : Gilles Deleuze and the Cinema of West Africa”in The Brain is the Screen: Gilles Deleuze and the Philosophy of Cinema, Gregory Flaxman (ed.) (Mineapolis: University of Minnesota Press 2000).
[22] At the time of his death (1995), Gilles Deleuze intended to develop even more this criticism by going back to the studies of Marx. In this perspective, his contributions to film studies in the Eighties would certainly not lead to favour a kind of “ethnic” or “communitarian” capitalism but an exact opposite route.
[23] “Assimilationism” is only part of an issue.

Created on: Thursday, 16 December 2004 | Last Updated: 16-Dec-04