Night Nursery & Death and Cash are screening for $15 on May 22 as part of New York African Film Festival.
The 29th New York African Film Festival is presented under the banner Visions of Freedom: tuning into diverse and interconnected notions of freedom pertinent to Africa, the diaspora, and the world at large. This year’s festival presents programs that recall activisms past and usher in new anthems of the future to embrace a united front for liberation and expression.
Night Nursery
Moumouni Sanou, 2021, Burkina Faso, France & Germany, 67m
Dioula with English subtitles
In the district town of Bobo-Dioulasso, near Burkina Faso’s capital Ouagadougou, sex workers entrust their children to Ms. Coda, an elderly woman who has been taking care of countless youngsters for decades while their mothers take to the streets at night to work. Over the years, filmmaker Moumouni Sanou has managed to gain the trust of everyone involved in this unique set-up, together with a huge amount of insight into the lives of Odile and Farida, both of whom rely on Ms. Coda’s services. Sanou tenderly observes all aspects of their situation, including domestic work, downtime, and the most intimate moments of motherhood, as well as their relationship to Ms. Coda and how she raises their children.
DEK: Every evening in a popular area of the city of Bobo-Dioulasso in Burkina Faso, Ms. Coda welcomes the children of sex workers into her home. The young women then stroll through the "Black," a lively alley in the city center, until daybreak when they come to pick up their babies.
preceded by
Death and Cash
Lionel Doyigbé, 2020, Benin & France, 44m
Goun and French with English subtitles
In Benin, death sets into motion an economy where artisans, traders, and sellers of materials such as fabrics and gris-gris, find their income. In bereaved families, under social pressure to organize the most beautiful funeral in the country, one family member is designated to take care of common expenses. From negotiations to transactions, from the bank to the morgue, the waltz of service providers begins, dragging our hero into a race to debt for prestige, exhibited through the Aga—the grandiose festival that follows the funeral.
A Q&A with Moumouni Sanou & Lionel Doyigbé will follow the screening.
