Black Girl

Alternate title(s):
Foreign Title: La noire de . . .
Date: January 01, 1966 to February 01, 1967
Dates Note: 1966
Country of Origin: Senegal
Place of Origin: Senegal
Languages:
Color: B&W
Silent: No
Based On: Ousmane Sembène's novel Black Girl
Additional Info:

Curator Notes

Film Series/Exhibition Title: 
African Film Festival 2016
Description: 

Considered Africa’s first dramatic feature film, Black Girl won Sembène the 1966 Jean Vigo Prize at Cannes. It addresses lingering racism in postcolonial Africa in a visual style reminiscent of the French New Wave. Based on Sembène’s novel Voltäique, the film tells of the exile and despair of a Senegalese domestic servant, Diouana (Mbissine Thérèse Diop), who is taken to the French Riviera by her French employers. “Brimming with tragic wisdom and latent meaning, with finality and promise, with humor and pain . . . It is at this point that African cinema begins” (Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader).

Restored in 2015 by The Film Foundation’s World Cinema Project in collaboration with the Sembène Estate, Institut National de l’Audiovisuel, INA, Eclair laboratories and Centre National de Cinématographie. Restoration carried out at Cineteca di Bologna/ L’Immagine Ritrovata laboratory.

Authors/Roles: 
Susan Oxtoby

Related People

  • Person: 
    Ousmane Sembène
    Role: director
    Person: 
    Christian Lacoste
    Role: cinematographer
    Person: 
    Mbissine Thérèse Diop
    Role: actors
    Person: 
    Anne-Marie Jelinck
    Role: actors
    Person: 
    Momar Nar Sene
    Role: actors
    Person: 
    Robert Fontaine
    Role: actors
    Person: 
    Ousmane Sembène
    Role: screenwriter
    Person: 
    Cineteca di Bologna
    Role: source