The tenth Annual Chicago African Diaspora International Film Festival runs Friday, June 15, through Thursday, June 21, at Facets Cinematheque, 1517 W. Fullerton, 773-281-4114. Tickets are $9 ($15 for the opening-night program). Following are selected programs; for a full schedule see facets.org.
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Come Back, Africa Shot clandestinely in Johannesburg with a nonprofessional cast, this 1959 feature by director Lionel Rogosin (On the Bowery) is an extraordinary document of black life under apartheid. Even the scripted dialogue scenes have the immediacy of a newsreel; it’s the rare movie where the lapses in technical sophistication actually add to the feeling of authenticity. The main character is a poor miner who goes to Johannesburg in search of a better job, only to be tossed out by one callous employer after another. Rogosin notes the specifics of his daily struggle—such as the process of securing permits both to live and work in the city—and he’s no less observant of the vibrant social life of the shantytown where he ends up living. The movie contains several joyous musical performances that are as revealing as the overtly political sequences. In English and subtitled Afrikaans. —Ben Sachs 95 min. New print. A discussion and reception follow the Saturday screening. Sat 6/16, 6 PM, and Thu 6/21, 8:30 PM
One People Director Pim de la Parra, who’s spent most of his career working in the Netherlands, returned to his homeland of Suriname in the early days of its independence to make this little-known 1976 gem. Roy (Borger Breeveld), a Creole college student, is called back from the Netherlands to Suriname, where his mother is dying. Immediately after her funeral, he begins a passionate affair with a beautiful Hindu woman (Diana Gangaram Pandya), and the match inflames the prejudices of both their families. The loosely structured narrative poetically captures Roy’s reconnection to his culture: in one tightly edited montage, he grazes his way through an open market, sampling one food after another in an epicurean rapture. In Dutch, Hindustani, and Sranan with subtitles. —Joshua Katzman 111 min. Sun 6/17, 1 PM, and Wed 6/20, 8:30 PM
