BANEL E ADAMA

Director: Ramata-Toulaye Sy, Senegal/Mali/France 2023, 87 min., feature film, OmeU

Banel and Adama are a young couple living in a village community in northern Senegal. Their shared dream of an independent life outside the village, away from family and social obligations, threatens to fall apart when Adama refuses to become village chief and a short time later the rains fail to fall. To prevent the worst from happening, Adama has to work in the fields far away from Banel. While he seems to have given up on their shared dream of an independent life, the passionate and rebellious Banel continues to cling to it.

After its premiere at the Cannes International Film Festival, this visually fascinating drama with a cast of non-professional actors was awarded the main prize, the Bright Horizons Award, at the Melbourne International Film Festival.

About the director: Ramata-Toulaye Sy was born in Paris in the 1980s to Senegalese parents and studied screenwriting at La Fémis film school. She worked alongside Atiq Rahimi on the 2019 literary adaptation of Scholastique Mukasonga's novel NOTRE-DAME DU NIL, proofreading the script, assisting with the casting process and supporting the preparations for the shoot in Rwanda. Her short film debut ASTEL (2021), about a 13-year-old Fulbe girl in northern Senegal, was followed by her first feature film BANEL E ADAMA in 2023.