| Black Girl | |
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DVD Cover |
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| Directed by | Ousmane Sembène |
| Produced by | André Zwoboda |
| Written by | Ousmane Sembène |
| Starring | Mbissine Thérèse Diop, Anne-Marie Jelinek and Robert Fontaine |
| Cinematography | Christian Lacoste |
| Editing by | André Gaudier |
| Distributed by | New Yorker Video |
| Running time | 65 minutes |
| Country | France / Senegal |
| Language | French |
Black Girl is a 1966 film by the Senegalese writer and director Ousmane Sembène, starring Mbissine Thérèse Diop. Its original French title is La Noire de..., which means "The black girl of...", as in "someone's black girl". The film centers on a young Senegalese woman who moves from Senegal to France, to work for a rich French couple. It was the director's first feature-length film.[1] It is often considered the first Sub-Saharan African film by an African filmmaker to receive international attention.[2]
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Diouana, a young Senegalese woman, moves from Dakar, Senegal, to Antibes, France, to work for a rich French couple. In France, Diouana hopes to continue her former job as nanny, and looks forward to a cosmopolitan lifestyle. However, upon arrival in Antibes, the couple, especially the wife, begins to treat Diouana more harshly and she is forced to work in the capacity of a servant. Diouana becomes increasingly aware of her constrained and alienated situation and she becomes to question her life in France. Eventually she commits suicide in her employer's bathroom to escape the harsh reality of her disappointing new life in France.
This film addresses the effects of colonialism, racism and post-colonial identity in Africa and Europe. These themes are highlighted through the recurring appearance of an African mask, which Diouana gives to her employers on her first day of work at the house in Dakar. The mask is hung on the wall in the French couple's Senegalese apartment, along with other pieces of African art.
In his 1997 book Movies as Politics, Jonathan Rosenbaum makes a case for Black Girl as the symbolic genesis of sub-Saharan African filmmaking, at least to the extent that the authorship belonged to a born and bred African.[3]
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