Documentary: The abject of colonization 
"Africa 50" René Vautier, a scathing attack against French colonial policy prohibits France from 1950 to 1994, was screened on January 19 at the Cultural Center french Yaounde.
documentary In fact, it's a long story about the living conditions of the "natives" of Africa that the spectators were submitted Wednesday to the French Cultural Centre Yaounde. The film is a short film (17 minutes) shot black and white. The background is sound. The traditional African musical instruments arrived just in time to accompany the images real, poignant.
Here we see the convicts maneuver arm of the lock gates of the dam. There are men toiling under the sun in a boat load of bags of cocoa, with no hope of ever tasting chocolate that comes out. A little later, children frolic in the river Niger. Moreover, an entire village has been devastated. This filmed reality speaks for itself. But the text says René Vautier, after the actor approached to do was be withdrawn, more information. And it is a voice trembling with indignation, he recounts the atrocities of colonial soldiers on helpless people, and commented on the inhumane and humiliating tasks which they are subject to 50FF day. If children seem unconcerned, Vautier retorts: "What else would they do? For, only 4% of African children are enrolled, just enough to provide clerks to the colonial administration and accounting for corporations.
To defend a cause that he spontaneously kissed the director, now aged 83, shows the ugly face of colonialism in Africa, he was taught Never schools in France. But Africans do not want to let it go. Across the continent, liberation movements are born. Violently repressed by the settlers, they relentlessly pursue their claims. The film ends with the hope of release, the first fruits of independence which the wind blows a few years later.
46 years of censorship
In 1949, the League of Education control René Vautier, a young man of 21, who recently completed his directing studies at the Institute for Advanced Film Studies, a film about the lives of villagers in West Africa French to be shown to students in France. For several months, he traveled the Upper Volta (Burkina Faso), Mali, Côte d'Ivoire and Ghana. Outraged by the inhuman working conditions and humiliating blacks, René Vautier it the first anti-colonial film.
face the hostility of the authorities of the time he gets help from African students going to France to bring the 50 rolls that he has. In Paris, Vautier gives them to the League of teaching. But the police seized. The director still manages to steal 17 rolls, it will develop and add sound later. At the end of the year 1951, he organized the first release of the film in Quimper, France, with the support of youth movements. "Africa 50" was immediately banned in France. Despite this, the film continues to be broadcast. Vautier was sentenced to one year in jail and held for several months.
In an interview aired just after the film, René Vautier says that in 1994, "Africa 50" was presented by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. It was determined following the career Vautier, who account for roughly 25 committed documentaries, both on racism in France over the war in Algeria. In 1974, René Vautier has received a special tribute from the Film jury racist for all of his work.
Stephanie Dongmo
Technical
Title: Africa 50
Released: 1950, France
Length: 17 mm
Genre: Documentary
Director: René Vautier
Production: League French education, René Vautier
Distribution: Cinémathèque de Bretagne
