Africa Addio

Scene from Africa Addio photographing a burnt Arab village alongside with dead bodies in Zanzibar

The film was shot over the course of three years across most of sub-Saharan Africa. Most notably, the film features footage from the Congo, Tanganyika, Zanzibar, Angola, Kenya and South Africa. The documentary also includes some behind-the-scenes footage from the 1964 film Zulu.[5][6] Production was done on 35mm, a rarity for documentaries, which were almost always shot on 16mm at the time. Even more unique was the filmmakers' use of 2-perf Techniscope film. This gave the film a wide 2.35:1 aspect ratio despite using standard spherical lenses. Most documentaries were usually seen in the standard 1.33:1 aspect ratio, so a documentary being filmed on such a wide aspect ratio is something that wasn't seen for decades.

The filmmakers were in near-constant danger for most of filming, with Tanganyika and Zanzibar being especially dangerous. In Zanzibar, their planes were shot at and they witnessed rebels lighting a plane crewed by Germans on fire and capturing the people inside. In Dar es Salaam, they were almost shot for photographing a massacre. Jacopetti suffered a cut after a soldier smashed their vehicle's windshield with the butt of his rifle. However, the soldiers let them go because they saw on their passports that they were Italian, and thus, "not whites." Jacopetti would refer to this as "a miracle."

A soundtrack of the music used in the film was later released. The composer was Riz Ortolani (who had scored Mondo Cane that featured the tune later used for the hit single More). When making Africa Addio, lyrics were added to Ortolani's title theme, making a song called "Who Can Say?" that was sung by Jimmy Roselli. The song did not appear in the film, but (unlike the successful song More spawned by Mondo Cane) did appear on the United Artists Records soundtrack album.

Prior to the film's release, allegations arose that a scene depicting the execution of a Congolese Simba Rebel was actually a murder done for the cameras. This resulted in co-director Gualtiero Jacopetti being arrested on charges of snuff filming. The film's footage was seized by police, and the editing process was halted during the legal proceedings. He was acquitted after he and co-director Franco E. Prosperi produced documents proving they had arrived at the scene just before the execution took place.[7][8]

A tie-in book with the same title, written by John Cohen, was released by Ballantine to coincide with the film's release.[9]

Various cuts of the film have appeared over the years. The Italian and French versions were edited and were provided with narration by Jacopetti himself. The American version, with the explicitly shocking title Africa: Blood and Guts, was re-released in 1970 by Jerry Gross' company Cinemation Industries and had 40 minutes cut out, mainly traces of political context, and was edited and translated without the approval of Jacopetti. Indeed, the differences are such that Jacopetti has called this film “a betrayal of the original idea”.[10][11][12] Notable differences are thus present between the Italian and English-language versions in terms of the text of the film. Many advocates of the film feel that it has unfairly maligned the original intentions of the filmmakers. For example, the subtitled translation of the opening crawl in the Italian version reads:

"The Africa of the great explorers, the huge land of hunting and adventure adored by entire generations of children, has disappeared forever. To that age-old Africa, swept away and destroyed by the tremendous speed of progress, we have said farewell. The devastation, the slaughter, the massacres which we assisted belong to a new Africa – one which if it emerges from its ruins to be more modern, more rational, more functional, more conscious – will be unrecognizable.

"On the other hand, the world is racing toward better times. The new America rose from the ashes of a few white man, all the redskins, and the bones of millions of buffalo. The new, carved up Africa will rise again upon the tombs of a few white men, millions of black men, and upon the immense graveyards that were once its game reserves. The endeavor is so modern and recent that there is no room to discuss it at the moral level. The purpose of this film is only to bid farewell to the old Africa that is dying and entrust to history the documentation of its agony"[13]

The English version:

"The old Africa has disappeared. Untouched Jungles, huge herds of game, high adventure, the happy hunting ground – those are the dreams of the past. Today there is a new Africa - modern and ambitious. The old Africa died amidst the massacres and devastations we filmed. But revolutions, even for the better, are seldom pretty. America was built over the bones of thousands of pioneers and revolutionary soldiers, hundreds of thousands of Indians, and millions of Bison. The new Africa emerges over the graves of thousands of whites and Arabs, and millions of blacks, and over the bleak boneyards that once were the game reserves.

"What the camera sees, it films pitilessly, without sympathy, without taking sides. Judging is for you to do, later. This film only says farewell to the old Africa, and gives to the world the pictures of its agony."[14]

IMDb lists the total runtime as 140 minutes, and a 'complete' version on YouTube runs closest to that at 138 minutes, 23 seconds.[15] This is an Italian language version, with a clear soundtrack and legible English subtitling. IMDb lists the different runtimes for previously released versions: USA- 122'; Norway- 124'; and Sweden- 116'.

Praise was usually directed at the film's music and visuals, as well as the courage of the filmmakers to deliver such unique and risky footage to the world, especially of massacres that would have been covered up. Africa Addio features the only known combat footage of the Congo Mercenaries, and the only known visual evidence of the genocide of ethnic Arabs during the Zanzibar Revolution. In Italy, it won the 1966 David di Donatello award for producer Angelo Rizzoli. Some conservative publications, such as Italy's Il Tempo, praised the film.[9] In 1968 at the Carnival of Viareggio, a float inspired by the film took part and made by the master of papier-mâché Il Barzella. Some items from this float, along with other memorabilia including a copy of the book by John Cohen, are kept in Museum of Dizionario del Turismo Cinematografico in Verolengo.

Many commentators, however, accused it of racism and misrepresentation.[16][9] Jacopetti and Prosperi responded to criticism of the film by defending their intentions. In the 2003 documentary The Godfathers of Mondo, Prosperi argues that the criticism was due to the fact that, "The public was not ready for this kind of truth," and Jacopetti explicitly states that the film “was not a justification of colonialism, but a condemnation for leaving the continent in a miserable condition.”[8] The subsequent film collaboration between the two men, Addio Zio Tom, explored the horrors of American racial slavery and was intended (in part) to combat the charges of racism leveled against them following the release of Africa Addio[17] (though that, too, was criticized for perceived racism).[18][9]

Film directors Octavio Getino and Fernando Solanas harshly criticized the film in their manifesto Toward a Third Cinema, calling Jacopetti a fascist, and asserting that in the film, man is "viewed as a beast," and is "turned into an extra who dies so Jacopetti can comfortably film his execution."[19]

Film critic Roger Ebert, in a scathing 1967 review of the shortened American version of the film, called it "racist" and stated that it "slanders a continent." He drew attention to the opening narration:

"Europe has abandoned her baby," the narrator mourns, "just when it needs her the most." Who has taken over, now that the colonialists have left? The advertising spells it out for us: "Raw, wild, brutal, modern-day savages!"[20]

US Ambassador to the United Nations Arthur Goldberg condemned the film as "grossly distorted" and "socially irresponsible," noting the protests of five African UN delegates.[21] In West Germany, a protest movement against the film emerged after Africa Addio was awarded by the state-controlled movie rating board. The protest was chiefly organized by the Socialist German Student Union (SDS) and groups of African students. In West Berlin, the distributor resigned from showing the film after a series of demonstrations and damage to cinemas.[22]

Despite the filmmakers vehemently denying that anything in the film was staged, widespread rumors still claim that various scenes are inauthentic for entertainment purposes. Jacopetti has repeatedly stated that all images in the film are real and that nothing was ever staged.[23] In the documentary The Godfathers of Mondo, Jacopetti and Prosperi stressed that the only scenes they ever staged were in Mondo Cane 2.[7] In the same documentary, Prosperi described their filmmaking philosophy: “Slip in, ask, never pay, never reenact.”[8]