Country:Sudan

Director:Sarah Gubara

Program:Eastern Parallels

Summary:

This is a short documentary about the challenges facing the institution of education in Sudan. We look at the efforts at the broad based efforts to bring a general education to the children of Sudan, with a particular emphasis on the strategies utilized to bring a larger understanding of health issues and social problems.

Country:Sudan

Director:Sarah Gubara

Program:Eastern Parallels

Summary:

This film uses a strong metaphor which is highly suggestive of the circumstances of Gudallah Gubara himself with reference to Gubara’s interest in bringing things to light socially as well as through the practice of film compounded by Gubara’s ensuing blindness. But Sarah Gubara centers her film on the efforts of a self driven activist who attempts to rally people in the fight for freedom. The activisit discovers that the more freedom you attempt to claim, the more assuredly it shall be taken away from you.

Country:Sudan

Director:Sarah Gubara

Program:Eastern Parallels

Summary:

The most recent work of Sarah Gubara before assisting her father on his large scale production of The Miserable was this tragic drama concerning a very poor man who marries a wealthy woman and the disharmony that is generated by mutual misunderstandings that are difficult to disentangle. The man is soon engulfed in a tidal wave of jealousy that drives him to the brink of insanity and murder. The film depicts a theme common to the elder Gubara’s work in which certain strict social definitions finally contribute to a loss of the senses and finally deranged exile.

Country:Sudan

Director:Gudallah Gubara

Program:Eastern Parallels

Summary:

The elder filmmaker makes a strong statement against the practices of circumcision as they performed around Africa and particularly Sudan. The film is typical of the later Gubara films which are determined to take a stand against the tyrranies that are still keeping people down. Gubara has stated that circumcision is ‘Nothing more than a bad habit.’

Country:Sudan

Director:Gudallah Gubara

Program:Eastern Parallels

Summary:

We reprise Gubara’s most well known and acclaimed feature film. Tajoog is the beautiful cousin of a young tribal man who is deeply in love with her. He publically declares his love for her in a song.  The traditions of the tribe denounce such an act and as a consequence his uncle refuses his proposal to marry her. But after the young man departs and declares his repentance the marriage is finally allowed. But in the meantime another man has staked his interest in Tajoog which drives the young man to jealousy.

Country:Sudan

Director:Gudallah Gubara

Program:Eastern Parallels

Summary:

For his first feature film in many years, the legendary filmmaker from Sudan has chosen to adapt Victor Hugo’s classic novel Les Miserables for an African audience in the Arab language. The esteemed actor Gamal Hassan assumes the character of Jean Valjean from who is a man driven to crime and nerfarious activities after circumstances have driven him in this direction. However, with the help of others he manages an incredible transformation. Gubara clearly saw this narrative as a significant parable concerning the will to change perceived as crucial for the future of Sudan.

Country:Ethiopia

Director:Daniel Taye Workou

Program:Eastern Parallels

Summary:

In the Ethiopian countryside a lot can happen on the long way to the market. A father and his son follow all the people’s good advice…and come back to their senses. Adaptation of a folk Tale.

Country:Ethiopia

Director:Ermias Woldeamlak

Program:Eastern Parallels

Summary:

The painter Alazar gives his best friend Yonas shelter at a time when Ethiopia is terrorised by the Der military regime. Before long Alazar and Yonas are captured and sentenced to death. Alazar manages to regain his freedom, but pays a hefty price. After seven years Yonas sister suddenly re-enters his life and is the trigger in confronting the harrowing events of the past. Doubt sets in: who is the father of Alazar’s daughter?

Country:Ethiopia

Director:Yenon Endale and Daniel Negatu

Program:Eastern Parallels

Summary:

“My dad drinks like hell, I loose my mom due to HIV Aids but my father does not loose a wife. This is my fight to get even with my dad”. Fighting with Father follows the story of a young man Yonas, who must come to grips with his father’s destructive behaviour and the resulting chaos that behaviour wrecks on Yonas family. Yonas emulates his father’s behaviour in an effort to understand it. Written from the real life experiences and dream fantasies of the young co-writer of the film, this is a film which re-enacts the past and documents Yonas effort to reconcile with his father.

Country:Mozambique

Director:20 min.

Program:Eastern Parallels

Summary:

On the night-time streets of Beira Port in Mozambique, commercial sex workers hold their own informal clinics to protect themselves against HIV. A rich and thought-provoking film by a pioneering Mozambican director.
Mozambican director Gabriel Mondlane was trained as a sound engineer and has worked in the Mozambican film industry as sound engineer, writer, director and camera person. He has been active in the Mozambican film industry since 1978 and has written and directed more than ten documentaries. He is the chair of AMOCINE, the Mozambican Association of Filmmakers.