Lili et le baobab (2006) - film review

Lili, a thirty-something photographer, accepts a commission to take some photographs of a town in Senegal.  Here, she befriends a secretive local woman, Aminata and, despite the language barrier, Lili develops a liking for the country and its people.  On her return to France, she receives a letter from Aminata informing her that she is in danger, because she is pregnant and unmarried.  Without a moment’s reflection, Lili decides to come to her help...

For her first full-length film director Chantal Richard draws heavily on her own experiences of Africa and delivers a highly personal account of a westerner succumbing to the charms of the Dark Continent, one that is strikingly simple in its design and yet subtly poignant.  Despite the pared back mise-en-scène and threadbare narrative (which would struggle to sustain a commercial film of this length), Lili et le baobab is the archetypal auteur film offering a thoughtful meditation on the vast cultural gulf that lies between two continents and the common humanity that binds us to one another. 

Who better than Romane Bohringer, an actress with a rare talent for projecting her characters’ inner thoughts and emotions onto the screen, to take us on a contemplative journey of the soul into an unfamiliar country which evokes unfamiliar sensations?  Some spectators may find the film’s languorous pace and sparse narrative off-putting, but for those who seek a richer cinematic experience Lili et le baobab provides a rewarding digression from the beaten track, reminding us perhaps that Africa requires our emotional support as much as it needs our financial and technical help in the years that lie ahead.  After all, if you believe the anthropologists, Africa is where we all came from, our common ancestry.  Chantal Richard’s film brings to the well-worn phrase ’We are all Africans’ an irresistible resonance.

© filmsdefrance.com 2011

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