CEDDO (1977) dir. OUSMANE SEMBÈNE
seen from Bulgaria
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seen from Malaysia
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seen from United States
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seen from United States
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seen from Armenia
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CEDDO (1977) dir. OUSMANE SEMBÈNE
Have you seen Ceddo (1977)?
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Ceddo | 1977 | Ousmane Sembène | Senegal
reference clocked i see u trisha biggar
In precolonial Senegal, members of the Ceddo (or “outsiders”) kidnap Princess Dior Yacine (Tabata Ndiaye) after her father, the king, pledges loyalty to an ascendant Islamic faction that plans to convert the entire clan to its faith. Attempts to recapture her fail, provoking further division and eventual war between the animistic Ceddo and the fundamentalist Muslims, with Christian missionaries and slave traders from Europe also playing a role in the conflict. Banned in Senegal upon its release, Ceddo is an ambitious, multilayered epic that explores the combustible tensions among ancient tradition, religious colonization, political expediency, and individual freedom.
470 to go
The Rules of the Game (1939, dir. Jean Renoir): Apparently this movie was considered scandalous when it first came out? Incredibly funny to me considering a bunch of rich assholes running around cheating on each other is the most french cinema thing I can think of. Anyway, this movie is great, the hunting scene is a particular highlight.
The Descendants (2011, dir. Alexander Payne): The constant voice over narration at the beginning was painful to sit through. Once that stopped the movie improved but it was still pretty bad. Not sure how it made the list.
Spellbound (1945, dir. Alfred Hitchcock): "I can fix him": The Movie.
A Tale of the Wind (1988, dir. Joris Ivens, Marceline Loridan-Ivens): A strange, captivating watch about the impossible task of filming the wind. As a fellow asthmatic, I really related to Ivens.
Ceddo (1977, dir. Ousmane Sembéne): This movie is rather slow and drags in places but even so I would still consider it a masterpiece. It has one of the most powerful endings I've seen in a while.
Tokyo Olympiad (1965, dir. Kon Ichikawa): So I kind of watched this movie twice? Or rather, I watched it on youtube not realizing it was a shorter cut, then went back and watched the full cut the moment I realized my mistake (that's five hours of Tokyo Olympiad in one day!).
I don't think I would have bothered if this weren't some of the most incredible documentary filmmaking I've ever seen. The cinematography is unbelievable, as in I could not believe they managed to get some of this footage, and I was moved to tears at several points. This is why I love cinema.
13 October 2021
Film: CEDDO (d. Ousmane Sembène, 1977, Senegal).
Forum: Block Cinema Northwestern Univ. Format: 35mm
Observations: Some 40-50 people gathered for this rare Chicago screening of a Sembène masterpiece, an allegorical tale of a revolt against a king and his imam who forcibly convert the local population. It's a demanding film (a lot of it involving lengthy debates among the different groups of characters) that requires staying power and attention, and gradually builds to a dynamic finale. Gorgui I. Tall, an NW graduate student, offered an introduction based on his studies of the filmmaker and African oral tradition. The film was flawlessly projected from a private collector's print (film rights courtesy of Janus Films).