Sambizanga (film)

Sambizanga is a 1972 film directed by Sarah Maldoror and written by Maldoror, Mário Pinto de Andrade, and Maurice Pons, based on the 1961 novella The Real Life of Domingos Xavier by José Luandino Vieira. Set in 1961 during the onset of the Angolan War of Independence, it follows the struggles of Angolan militants involved with the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA), an anti-colonial political movement. Maldoror co-wrote the screenplay with her husband, who was a leader within the MPLA. Sambizanga was the first feature film produced by a Lusophone African country.[1]

This article is about the 1972 film. For the municipality, see Sambizanga, Angola.
Sambizanga
Directed bySarah Maldoror
Screenplay byMário Pinto de Andrade
Maurice Pons
Sarah Maldoror
Based onA vida verdadeira de Domingos Xavier
by José Luandino Vieira
StarringDomingos de Oliveira
Elisa Andrade
CinematographyClaude Agostini
Edited byGeorge Klotz
Production
company
Isabelle Films
Distributed byNew Yorker Films (United States)
Animatógrafo (Portugal)
Release date
  • 19 October 1972 (1972-October-19) (Portugal)
Running time
102 minutes
CountriesPortuguese Angola
France
People's Republic of the Congo
LanguagesPortuguese
Kimbundu
Lingala

Plot

The film is set in the titular Sambizanga, a working-class neighbourhood in Luanda where a Portuguese prison was located in which many Angolan militants were tortured and killed. On 4 February 1961, the prison was attacked by MPLA forces.[2]

Domingos Xavier, a revolutionary, is arrested by Portuguese colonial officials. He is taken to the prison in Sambizanga, where he is threatened with torture and death if he does not give the officials the names of his fellow dissidents. During his imprisonment, Domingos' wife Maria goes from prison to prison, trying to find out what has happened to her husband, unaware of the extent of his involvement in the anti-colonial struggle. Unbeknownst to her, Domingos is killed in prison.[3][4]

Cast
  • Domingos de Oliveira as Domingos Xavier
  • Elisa Andrade as Maria
  • Jean M'Vondo as Petelo
  • Dino Abelino as Zito
  • Benoît Moutsila as Chico
  • Talagongo as Miguel
  • Lopes Rodrigues as Mussunda
  • Henriette Meya as Bebiana
  • Manuel Videira as the PIDE agent
  • Ana Wilson as the narrator

Production

Sambizanga was based on a 1961 novella by José Luandino Vieira, a white Angolan writer born in Portugal who had served a 11-year prison sentence for his work in the anti-colonial struggle in Angola.[4]

Sambizanga was shot on location in the People's Republic of the Congo over a seven-week period.[5]

Many of the actors in the film were non-professionals who were involved in African anti-colonial movements such as the MPLA and the African Party for the Independence of Guinea and Cape Verde (PAIGC).[6] Domingos de Oliveira, who played Domingos Xavier, was an Angolan exile living in the Congo; while Maria was played by Elisa Andrade, an economist from Cape Verde.[5]

Release and reception

Sambizanga was released in Portugal on 19 October 1974 following the Carnation Revolution and was also released in Angola the same year following its independence.[7]

Writing in The Village Voice, Michael Kerbel compared Sambizanga to Soviet Russian filmmaker Sergei Eisenstein's 1925 film Battleship Potemkin in terms of its political significance.[8] Writing in 2012 for The Guardian, Mark Cousins named the film as one of the ten best African films, describing it "as bold, as well-lit as Caravaggio paintings".[9]

Nwachukwu Frank Ukadike praised Sambizanga for its feminist themes, writing that it "gives female subjectivity special attention, as it pertains to revolutionary struggles... the feminist aspect of the film becomes apparent... as it is aimed at giving credibility to women's participation".[10]

Maldoror won the Tanit d'Or at the 1972 Carthage Film Festival. Sambizanga also screened at the 1973 Berlin International Film Festival.[11]

In 2021, Sambizanga was restored by the African Film Heritage Project, an initiative created by the Film Foundation's World Cinema Project, the Pan-African Federation of Filmmakers, and UNESCO, with the blessing of Maldoror's family.[12]

See also

References
  1. Stewart, Katy (11 July 2018). "A closer look at Angolan cinema". Cinema Escapist. Retrieved 23 April 2023.
  2. Dembrow, Michael (1987). "Sambizanga and Sarah Maldoror". Spot. Archived from the original on 15 March 2012. Retrieved 23 April 2023.
  3. Breitmeyer, Alice (4 June 2014). "To what extent was Sarah Maldoror's Sambizanga shaped by the ideology of MPLA?". Buala. Retrieved 23 April 2023.
  4. ""Sambizanga" de Sarah Maldoror". Cases Rebelles (in French). July 2013. Retrieved 23 April 2023.
  5. Gugler, Josef (2003). African film: re-imagining a continent. Martlesham: Boydell & Brewer. pp. 55–56. ISBN 978-0852555620.
  6. Frank Ukadike, Nwachukwu (1994). Black African cinema. Berkeley: University of California Press. pp. 233–235. ISBN 9780520912366.
  7. Sandhu, Sukhdev (31 May 2019). "The hour of liberation". 4 Columns. Retrieved 23 April 2023.
  8. Kerbel, Michael (6 December 1973). "Angola: brutality & betrayal". Village Voice.
  9. Cousins, Mark (3 September 2012). "African cinema: ten of the best". The Guardian. Retrieved 23 April 2023.
  10. Frank Udadike, N. (1994). "Reclaiming images of women in films from Africa and the black diaspora". Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies. 15 (1): 102–122. doi:10.2307/3346615. JSTOR 3346615 – via JSTOR.
  11. "Sambizanga - Awards". IMDb. Retrieved 23 April 2023.
  12. "Sambizanga (1972) - projection et discussion". Palais de Tokyo (in French). Retrieved 23 April 2023.
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