Mueda, Memory and Massacre

After independence was declared, Ruy Guerra returned to Mozambique from Brazil—where he had been a key figure in the Cinema Novo movement—and helped establish the National Film Institute. His depiction of a reenactment of the 1960 Mueda massacre, which triggered the war of independence, was the first feature-length film of Mozambican cinema. Hundreds of people were killed when Portuguese troops fired on peaceful demonstrators protesting the arrest of two exiles. Locals, including survivors who also offer testimony, participate in this regularly staged political theater, playing both the victims and the oppressors.