2024 documentary film by Mati Diop

2月，法国阿尔卑斯山。瓦莉娜喜欢光脚踩过小木屋的地板，瓦莉娜喜欢玩雪和拿佳能相机乱拍，瓦莉娜喜欢白色沙发散发的皮革气味，瓦莉娜喜欢她的棕色绒毛小兔：寿司，最重要的是，瓦莉娜喜欢她年轻的美国保姆玛丽·珍...

She used to say: “Naku Penda Piya - Naku Taka Piya – Mpenziwe” in the opening of Michael Jackson’s song Liberian Girl. Words can be mentally repeated, he would say: “I love you so much – I want you so much – My love.” With the green background, the slow chords on his electronic keyboard, the stiff strikes of musician Wilbert Gavin of the Cities Aviv band, this dancer radiates intense energy.

2012 film by Mati Diop

Short lo-fi film set in Senegal. Mostly focussing on a group of Senegalese youths, discussing their hopes and fears concerning the crossing of the atlantic to get to Europe. Will life be easier there or not?

Made during confinement, “In My Room” plunges us into the poignant story of a woman at the twilight of her life, through recordings of the director’s deceased grandmother. Living rooms become stages where life is performed. Windows become portals to the lives of others.

The film accompanies Magaye Niyang, a star of Touki-Bouki, a 1972 classic directed by her own uncle Djibril Diop. Following this path, we are witness of Niyang travel to a special screening of the film, which has a public release in his old town. Niyang seems detached and with a heavy longing from the past, and therefore, the film debris permeates everything with unescapable sorrow and fascination. Diop film is, first and foremost, a nostalgic travel through memory, time and recreation. It is also a watermark in contemporary experimental documentary, a very intimate portrait of a lost long journey through the past that isn’t returning anymore, a detachment of rejected fame, recognition and connection which is heavily grounded on a legacy that belongs to the past, and that connects directly to a country (Senegal) and its heritage, which is sometimes feel excruciating for the old ones (a testimony such as the taxi scene in the film, where the cab driver longs for changes, and claims that the old generation had done nothing for that). Mille Soleils (A Thousand Suns) and, in itself, Mati Diop’s crucial talent, should be a point of reference into what could easily be one of the most interesting proposals of hybrid documentary cinema which has come from France, and which deals with a strong African heritage. Since 35 Rhums, where she proved her actress talent, Diop seems like a true promise for the following years of cinema.

2019 film by Mati Diop