UNA MOTHER, A DAUGHTER
Type: ode to female independence
Directed by Mahamat-Saleh Haroun. Starring Achouackh Abakar Souleymane, Rihane Khalil Alio, Youssouf Djaoro, Briya Gomdigue, Sasle Sambo, Hadje Fatime
Achouackh Abakar Souleymane and Rihane Khalil Alio (photo by Mathieu Giombini / Pili Films).
Prolific director but little seen in Italy (only Daratt-The season of forgiveness had arrived in our cinemas, after the applause gathered in Venice), here the Chadian Mahamat-Saleh Haroun chooses a style of pure simplicitymade up of essential shots, to underline and reaffirm the centrality of the human figure (it brings to mind the first Pasolini, with a secular disenchantment instead of sacredness) and recounting Amina’s odyssey when she discovers that her 15-year-old daughter Maria, whom she raised alone, is pregnant.
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A mother, a daughter: the clip
The girl wants to have an abortion and her mother decides to help her despite the prohibition of religion and law. You have to find the money, get around the prohibitions, know who to ask for help: through the camera, the director’s eye seems to limit itself to observing, documenting, but in this way it brings out even more clearly the tragic and inferiority of the female condition, crushed by an overwhelmingly male-dominated society.
In which the protagonist offers a pained and at the same time indomitable portrait of those who have learned to fight (and even take revenge), capable of piercing the screen without the need for too many words.
For those who do not want to forget what the African woman is.
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