I enjoyed reading about a new film dealing with the german colonial genocide of the herero. However, however...it did drive me nuts in its weak and even false claims. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/mar/22/most-are-unaware-film-highlights-germanys-genocidal-past-in-namibia
Firstly, the African Literature ASSN had its annual conference in bayreuth about 10 years ago, and the minister of culture came to our conference and expressed his government's contrition over the genocide. The review acts as though that contrition had never occurred. It's like all those journalists who come to africa to discover--again--the atrocities or failures of the past that had been written about time and again. Ther germans sought to make amends and expressed real public contrition.
What drove me nuts, however, was treating this film as if it were a new FILMIC discovery, whereas one of africa's most important filmmakers, jean marie teno, had already created a truly magnificent film on precisely this topic, Le Malentendu Colonial in 2004. There teno had interviewed the german missionaries and their archives in germany, and then got the namibians' story in namibia. There is nothing new about the "discoveries" in this new german film, except that the reviewer apparently is ignorant about african film, and doubtless about africa. Teno's film was a major film, not a hidden minor work.
Nothing new, but still annoying, and The Guardian is at fault this time.
Ken
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