©Kijiweni Productions
Kinospielfilm | 2019-2020 | Romantik | Tansania
Hauptdaten
| Regie | Amil Shivji |
|---|---|
| Drehbuch | Amil Shivji, Jenna Bass |
| Produktion | Kijiweni Productions [tz], Big World Cinema [za] |
| Verleih/Vertrieb | JIP Film und Verleih [de] |
Kurzinhalt
Vuta N’Kuvute (Tug of War) based on Adam Shafi’s award-winning Swahili novel, is a coming-of-age political drama about love and resistance set in the final years of British colonial Zanzibar. The film weaves through 1950s coastal culture across the divides of class and racial segregation that were imposed by the colonial regime. Denge, a frustrated and rebellious Zanzibari young man who is part of the freedom struggle against British rule meets Yasmin, a recent runaway Indian-Zanzibari bride whose equal rebelliousness drives her to seek her own independence. Their romantic but forlorn relationship is coupled with the daily struggles of finding their place in the resistance movements for independence.
After running away from her newly wedded, Yasmin faces rejection from her own family at home. She seeks refuge at a friend’s house in the Swahili quarters of segregated Zanzibar, immersing herself in an oppressed yet effervescent culture that she had always been secluded from. Her initial self-indulgence is brought to question by the selfless woes of the people around her. Her own awareness is contextualized by a larger struggle for self-reliance of an entire people. Denge and Yasmin meet in a romantic setting lit by lanterns throwing shadows across rusty windows and washed down walls. We find Denge more engaged in youth decadency rather than in revolutionary struggle. Although his conviction for the fight for Zanzibar’s autonomy is clear, his youthful frivolity betrays his ideological calling. He is a portrait of a frustrated young man on the verge of giving up but his fighting spirit is reignited through his passion for Yasmin. Yasmin, naïve to the attention and freedom of young men her age, finds herself part of a struggle that leads to her own self-awareness.
Vuta N’Kuvute is a story of a people, the self and the other. It ties together struggles at all levels of oppression in a colonial society into a history of one people, a free-er people.
https://www.kijiweniproductions.com/films/vuta-nkuvute
After running away from her newly wedded, Yasmin faces rejection from her own family at home. She seeks refuge at a friend’s house in the Swahili quarters of segregated Zanzibar, immersing herself in an oppressed yet effervescent culture that she had always been secluded from. Her initial self-indulgence is brought to question by the selfless woes of the people around her. Her own awareness is contextualized by a larger struggle for self-reliance of an entire people. Denge and Yasmin meet in a romantic setting lit by lanterns throwing shadows across rusty windows and washed down walls. We find Denge more engaged in youth decadency rather than in revolutionary struggle. Although his conviction for the fight for Zanzibar’s autonomy is clear, his youthful frivolity betrays his ideological calling. He is a portrait of a frustrated young man on the verge of giving up but his fighting spirit is reignited through his passion for Yasmin. Yasmin, naïve to the attention and freedom of young men her age, finds herself part of a struggle that leads to her own self-awareness.
Vuta N’Kuvute is a story of a people, the self and the other. It ties together struggles at all levels of oppression in a colonial society into a history of one people, a free-er people.
https://www.kijiweniproductions.com/films/vuta-nkuvute