This entry in our Chimurenganyana series takes the form of a mixtape on the soundworld of the acclaimed Guadeloupean filmmaker Sarah Maldoror (1929-2020), decomposed, an-arranged and reproduced by Ntone Edjabe.
“Listening to Sambizanga allows us to hear the quality of the silences –- Maldoror uses dialogue like a deft trumpeter who plays notes to guide us from one silence to another. And throughout the film, these clearings are marked by song.”
“We pause at the House of Diop, here, to listen more closely to the interplay of cinema and music that Maldoror inaugurated with the Monangambée/Sambizanga diptych – a film that is music followed by another about music.”
“Maldoror’s portrait of Damas is the closest she gets to the mixtape as narrative form. She sprinkles his words on a set of thematically arranged music tracks which are bridged by the opinions of his better-known comrades, Cesaire and Senghor. Visually, the themes oscillate btwn the land and waterscapes of Guyane and the toxic buzz of Paris-Nègre. Plus, a cloud of mosquitoes here, a trail of ants there, all cut to the rhythm of Damas’ poetry. And of silences.”
Listen here for the audio accompaniment, which conveys what we cannot or refuse to write.
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