Important Dates
Cinema Africa 2024/25
14.10.2024, 6 and 8 pm
Cineplex Bayreuth, Hindenburgstraße 2, 95445 Bayreuth
For the 16th time, the film festival Cinema Africa takes place at the University of Bayreuth. For this installment,however, there is an innovation: the festival will not be held exclusively during one week, but spread over several months. First up is Monday, 14 October 2024 where two African movies will be shown in Bayreuth's Cineplex.
CINEMA AFRICA 24/25 - OCTOBER 2024
14.10.2024, 6 pm:
Disco Africa – A Malagasy Story
(France / Madagascar / Germany / Mauritius / South Africa, 2024, fiction, French and Malgache, English subtitles, 81min) by Luck Razanajaona
In Madagascar, 20-year-old Kwame struggles to make a living in the clandestine sapphire mines. An unexpected event takes him back to his hometown. There, as he is reunited with his mother and old friends, he is also confronted by the rampant corruption that plagues his country: corruption, easy money, political struggles. The film echoes the African civil rights movements of the 1970s – an era which marked an artistic and musical awakening as a continuation of the struggle for independence. In Kwame’s personal story, the film also addresses the legacy of colonialism and the history of resistance and throws a spotlight on the contemporary situation.
14.10.2024, 8 pm:
Zaho Zay
(France, Austria, Madagascar, 2023, docu-fiction, French and Malgache, English subtitles, 79min) by Maéva Ranaivojaona and Georg Tiller, script by Raharimanana
In ZAHO ZAY, the directing team of Maéva Ranaïvojaona and Georg Tiller weaves together an unusual, haunting hybrid of documentary and fiction, lyric poetry and social reflection. It is a film that resists any easy synopsis, as its narrative aspect is fleeting, periodic, allusive. The voice of a woman (text by Jean Luc Raharimanana) conjures up both the world she inhabits as the guard at a crowded prison in Madagascar, and the wandering, perhaps mythic father she scarcely knew – a murderer who decides his crimes by rolling dice.
M. Ranaivojaona and Jean Luc Raharimanana will be present for the screening and the subsequent discussion!
Maéva Ranaïvojaona (*1983 Toulouse) is a French-Madagascan author, director and producer who lives and works in Vienna. Her films have been shown and won awards at international film festivals such as the Rotterdam International Film Festival, the FID Marseille and the Viennale.
Raharimanana is a novelist, essayist, and poet, as well as writing and directing plays and musicals. As an editor, he cofounded Editions Project’îles with poet Nassuf Djailani.
His prizes include the Prix du théâtre interafricain 1990 for his play The Prophet and the President; the Grand Prix Littéraire de Madagascar (ADELF) for Rêves sous le linceul, published by Serpent à plumes in 1998; Prix de la Poésie du Salon du Livre insulaire d’Ouessant, for Les cauchemars du gecko, Vents d’ailleurs, 2011. He was awarded the Prix Jacques Lacarrière in 2018 for his novel Revenir, Éditions Payot/Rivages (forthcoming in English from Seagull Books in 2025, translated by Allison M. Charette). His latest work is La Voix, le Loin, 100 poèmes, Vents d’ailleurs, 2021.
In 2023, he received the Prix International de la littérature francophone Benjamin Fondane for his body of work, awarded by the Romanian Cultural Institute under the auspices of the Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie.
He founded SoaZara, a theater company, in 2014. His creations include La Voix, le loin (2022), Rano rano (2016), Parfois le vide (2018), Soonoo (for young audiences, 2021), and Les contes de la Grande île (musical tales). A multidisciplinary artist, he recently created an installation entitled La Voix, le Loin, 100 poèmes which weaves together poetry, photography, video, sculpture, and music (Musée de Bibracte, Centre d’Art et du Paysage de Vassivière 2021, Médiathèque de Bandrélé 2022, Musée de la photographie de Madagascar 2023).
He also writes for film, and has collaborated with filmmakers Maéva Ranaivojaona and Georg Teller to write the voice-over for the film Zaho Zay: Prix Renaud Victor et Mention spéciale Georges de Beauregard International au FIDMarseille 2020; Prix Mehrwert à la Viennale 2020, Festival International du Film de Vienne.
He was the cowriter for Robin Campillo’s film “L’île rouge” (2023; Grand Prix du Festival de Cannes 2017). He collaborated with filmmaker Lova Nantenaina on Zanaka, ainsi parlait Félix, which received the Prix Poulain d’argent, FESPACO 2019 and the Zébu d’or, Rencontres du film court, Antananarivo.
Since 2004, he has co-directed and presented the Festival Plumes d’Afrique (Indre and Loire, France), which offers plays, debates, roundtables, exhibitions, concerts, films, and academic projects related to literary and artistic creation in Francophone Africa.