Saturday, August 13, 2022
flickfeast
  • News
  • Reviews
  • Festivals
  • FrightFeast
  • Spotlight
  • Contribute
  • Submissions
    • Advertise on Flickfeast
    • Submit a Film
No Result
View All Result
flickfeast
  • News
  • Reviews
  • Festivals
  • FrightFeast
  • Spotlight
  • Contribute
  • Submissions
    • Advertise on Flickfeast
    • Submit a Film
No Result
View All Result
FLICKFEAST
No Result
View All Result
Home Reviews HE Reviews

Timbuktu (2014)

Will Day-Brosnan by Will Day-Brosnan
September 1, 2015
in HE Reviews
Timbuktu (2014)
14
SHARES
1.4k
VIEWS
Share on FacebookShare on Twitter

Timbuktu is sparse, meditative storytelling which barely conceals its anger at religious totalitarianism and nihilistic barbarism.

The film is one in which personal tragedy painfully intersects with larger politico-religious transformations which are taking place; an accidental murder involving a cattle herder Kidane (played with quiet dignity by Ibrahim Ahmed) coincides with the Islamist takeover of Mali, and the imposition of its quasi-medieval legal code.

You might also like

Belle (2021) – Home Entertainment Review

Death on the Nile (2022) – Blu-ray Review

The Mitchells Vs The Machines (2021)- Blu-ray Review

One of the director Abderrahmane Sissako’s achievements is to show just how parochial and oppressive the injunctions of this sort of Sharia are: from women having to cover their hands and feet, and men having to roll up their trouser legs, to a new prohibition on people standing outside their own homes. Amongst the enforcers of this stringent law, hypocrisy and double standards abound.

Timbuktu’s set pieces are particularly memorable: people sing proudly, hauntingly, in their homes, in defiance of a ban on music. Another segment depicts a group of young men playing football without a ball because the sport has been outlawed. They run around miming their game, like some kind of balletic dumb-show. The match is a complex symbol of resistance, social imagination, and the negative of a law which forbids them from having fun. Out of proscription comes celebration, streaming around the dusty pitch in football shirts of every different colour.

Sofian El Fani’s camera work is exemplary throughout, moving seamlessly from wide-framed landscapes to an intimate focus on the human face and its expressions (the latter is unsurprising given his close-up work in Blue is the Warmest Colour). The sonic landscape is similarly sparse and expansive, akin to the stretches of field, desert, water and shadow depicted on screen. There is something (and I hesitate with the implications of the word) elemental about the film; and, this is reinforced later by the introduction of ritual witchcraft which points to an older, indigenous culture— uneasily coexisting with Islam.

In fact, what is striking is how culturally distinct the jihadi occupiers in the film are from the people they are oppressing; there are numerous translators and intermediaries required to communicate between the different people. The new enforcers do not speak the local language, they only speak Arabic, and seemingly know little of native traditions. What’s more, the takeover represents a schism with the past, starting again from a nihilistic blank. To watch this film is to be continually reminded of Edmund Burke’s comments concerning the French Revolution and the Jacobins’ desire to reconstruct society according to new principles, with no respect for the accumulated strata of history and culture.

All this, perhaps, makes the film sound far more drily political and symbolic than it actually is; Sissako’s triumph is to powerfully depict the politico-religious transformations through the experiences of a single family, and local community. This is humane, complex, beautiful film-making of the highest order.

Timbuktu was released on DVD and Blu-Ray on the 10th August, 2015.

Director: Abderrahmane Sissako
Writers: Abderrahmane Sissako, Kessen Tall
Stars: Ibrahim Ahmed, Abel Jafri, Toulou Kiki
Runtime: 97 mins
Country: France, Mauritania

Film Rating: ★★★★½

Tags: Abderrahmane SissakoAbel JafriIbrahim AhmedMaliSofian El FaniTimbuktu
Will Day-Brosnan

Will Day-Brosnan

Related Posts

Belle (2021) - Home Entertainment Review
HE Reviews

Belle (2021) – Home Entertainment Review

by Jed Wagman
June 27, 2022
Death on the Nile (2022) - Blu-ray Review
HE Reviews

Death on the Nile (2022) – Blu-ray Review

by Jed Wagman
April 11, 2022
The Mitchells Vs The Machines (2021)- Blu-ray Review
HE Reviews

The Mitchells Vs The Machines (2021)- Blu-ray Review

by Jed Wagman
December 13, 2021
Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011)- 4K Blu-ray Review
Film Review

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011)- 4K Blu-ray Review

by Jed Wagman
December 6, 2021
Superman & Lois
HE Reviews

‘Superman and Lois’ (2021) Series Review

by Jenna Scott
December 2, 2021

Recommended

Rage (2010)

January 8, 2012

TRON: Legacy (2010)

December 6, 2010

Don't miss it

Nope (2022) – Film Review
Film Review

Nope (2022) – Film Review

August 9, 2022
Alone Together (2022) – Film Review
Reviews

Alone Together (2022) – Film Review

August 4, 2022
Bullet Train (2022) – Film Review
Film Review

Bullet Train (2022) – Film Review

August 3, 2022
Anything’s Possible (2022) – Film Review
Reviews

Anything’s Possible (2022) – Film Review

July 31, 2022
Sofa Surfer (2022)
Reviews

Sofa Surfer (2021) – Short Film Review

August 5, 2022
Where The Crawdads Sing – Film Review
Film Review

Where The Crawdads Sing – Film Review

July 22, 2022
flickfeast

Whetting your appetite for cinema with the best film reviews and features since 2009

© Copyright - flickfeast. All Rights Reserved.

No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • News
  • Reviews
  • Festivals
  • FrightFeast
  • Spotlight
  • Contribute

© Copyright - flickfeast. All Rights Reserved.

Posting....