#852: SEMBÈNE, Ousmane: Black Girl (1966)

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SEMBÈNE, Ousmane (Senegal)
Black Girl [1966]
Spine #852
Blu-ray


Ousmane Sembène was one of the greatest and most groundbreaking filmmakers who ever lived, as well as the most renowned African director of the twentieth century — and yet his name still deserves to be better known in the rest of the world. He made his feature debut in 1966 with the brilliant and stirring Black Girl. Sembène, who was also an acclaimed novelist in his native Senegal, transforms a deceptively simple plot — about a young Senegalese woman who moves to France to work for a wealthy white family and finds that life in their small apartment becomes a prison, both figuratively and literally — into a complexly layered critique of the lingering colonialist mind-set of a supposedly postcolonial world. Featuring a moving central performance by M'Bissine Thérèse Diop, Black Girl is a harrowing human drama as well as a radical political statement — and one of the essential films of the 1960s.

59 minutes
Black & White
Monaural
in French
1:37:1 aspect ratio
Criterion Release 2017
Director/Writers


Based on a novella by Ousmane Sembène.
Sembène was 43 when he wrote and directed Black Girl.

Other Sembène films in the Collection:

#1065: Mandabi (1968)
#1217a: Emitaï (1971)
#1217b: Xala (1975)
#1217c: Ceddo (1977)

The Film

A

Film Rating (0-60):

60

The Extras

 The Booklet

Twelve-page wraparound featuring an essay by critic Ashley Clark.

Commentary

None.

4K restoration

Of the short film Borom sarret (1963), director Sembène’s acclaimed debut.

Interviews

With scholars Manthia Diawara and Samba Gadjigo.

Excerpt

From a 1966 broadcast of JT de 20h, featuring Sembène discussing his win of the Prix Jean Vigo for Black Girl.

Interview

With actor Diop.

Sembène: The Making of African Cinema

A 1994 documentary about the filmmaker by Diawara and Ngūgī wa Thiong’o.

Alternate color sequence

Trailer

Extras Rating (0-40):

39

60 + 39 =

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