Moolaadé

An arguably justified winner of the Un Certain Regard section at last year’s Cannes Festival, Moolaadé takes as its subject, the painful and degrading practice of female circumcision which I was personally amazed to find from Production notes, still happens in at least 38 out of 50 countries in Africa.

The practice is couched in the religion of Islam but as argued by the director and the lead character, this is an act that is not necessarily in the worship of the religion, and in fact is really just a means of African men finding a way to have a hold over African women.

In the film, set in a rural village in Africa, a young mother Collé takes a stand and offers ‘moolaadé’ meaning ‘protection’ to her daughter and to four young girls against the traditionalists into circumcision. When a band of women come to the village equipped with vicious little knives to circumcise girls as young as 11, Collé says no to the circumcising of her daughter and the girls.

The male elders soon begin to put pressure on her, together with the circumcisors who feel that their role in society has been undermined by this defiant act. Two outsiders will have a bearing on what follows next. A young man returning from France having done his studies, is instantly a hero, but the girl he is destined to marry is Collé’s daughter and she being uncircumcised is disgraced.

Then there’s Mercenaire, an aptly-named traveling mobile shop-owner bringing overpriced bread and kitchen wares to a community. An ex-army man and a womanizer, he’s popular with the women because he brings nice clothes for them to buy. Mercenaire is tolerated by the village but he’ll do well to keep out of the dispute with Collé, if he values his safety.

Moolaadé is the second part of a trilogy of films for director Ousmane Sembene about heroism in daily life, and Collé’s admirable stand here certainly fits that bill. What is particularly good about Sembene’s film, quite apart from the beautiful colours, the authenticity and the naturalness in which its been shot, is the leading fact that it exposes a bad malpractice and shows in the burning of transistor radios in the main square (the men think that the women are getting too many ‘ideas’ merely from listening to their trannies) that male chauvinism is unfortunately alive and kicking in many villages in Africa where women are into subservience, arranged marriages and forced circumcision.

It’s a despicable state of affairs of course – those angry about it – will like the way Sembene’s film pans out and will hope (as I do) that if this films gets shown at all in Africa it might go some way to causing a reduction in the number of African countries in which it is practiced. It should never be forgotten that all human beings, and that includes all women, should have a choice when it comes to barbaric acts like this.

Matt Arnoldi