2021 ‘Vuta N'Kuvute’ Directed by Amil Shivji
A coming-of-age political love story set in the final years of British colonial Zanzibar. Denge, a young freedom fighter meets Yasmin, an Indian-Zanzibari woman in the middle of the night as she is on her way to be married. Passion and revolution escalate.
Estira-i-arronsa
USA
TIFF Premiere (Sept 9 - 18), release date not yet announced.
USA
Along the Indian Ocean shore and in the narrow streets and stone houses of 1950s Zanzibar, Yasmin and De defy the colonial authorities to pursue freedom and self-government as well as a forbidden romance. In a segregated city Yasmin is running from an arranged marriage and De struggles to distribute revolutionary pamphlets. Yasmin and De meet by chance and ever afterwards cannot bear to be apart from each other. Together they dream of a better future and see their city through new eyes.
This stylish, colorful, classic romance is shot Wong Kar-Wai In the Mood for Love style. It is a resplendent, playful, and gorgeous technique that utilizes odd camera angles (above and below characters, in water, and through windowsills),…
Amil and his team brought out the poor/working class character of 1950s Zanzibar with a vibrance and tenderness that will last. Evident too is the communal stitching together of this film. It was made by and for a people forced to maintain silence about the violence centuries of slavery and British colonialism wreaked. Generous fillings of Taarab music hold the film together with unique harmony. I’m elated that Vuta N’Kuvute has birthed itself into its own world of cinema.
Anti-imperialist love story! This is honestly one of the best films that's come out in years. Really beautiful aesthetics, the love story was the first time I understood and cared for a connection or romance in a movie. The glances they share, the expressions on their faces. Pure love. I don't understand how people said they didn't get or didn't care about this aspect. I found it very moving. Very good politics, gets into the conflicts between national liberation in Africa and Marxism from outside of Africa, as well as the complicated social dynamics of Zanzibar. Very interesting and unknown to me history. I'm only mad because I saw it at SIFF and have been wanting to watch it again ever since! Release the Blu-ray I'll buy 10 of them!
Gorgeous production design yielding some beautiful images but the story is composed of vague indicators and suggestions rather than concrete and specific action; perhaps in trying to represent to much it represents nothing in particular. It remains engaging on a visual level throughout.
Standing as Tanzania’s submission to the Academy Awards (its only the second submission in the country’s entire history) Amil Shivji’s Tug of War is an arresting anti-colonialist period piece adapted from Adam Shafi’s same-titled Swahili novel. Gudrun Columbus Mwanyika plays Denge, a Mswahili revolutionary fighting for Zanzibar’s independence from British colonial rule during the 1950s. He falls for a runaway Indian-Zanzibari bride named Yasmin (Ikhlas Gafur Vora) to form a beguiling story of love and rebellion.
Tug of War is a picture rendered with visual flair: shots slow to a crawl as Mwanyika, an actor with immense charisma, does his best Andre Holland impression, by making eyes with Yasmin as cigarette smoke sensually climbs from his lips. Vibrant uses of red further enraptures the frame, while touches of light jazz and suave club settings soundtrack scenes of critical political drama. Mwanyika and Vora give invigorating performances that actualize their characters’ longing, desires and steamy attractions to unforgettable ends. [via Substack]
Tug of War is an artistically ambitious film, that failed to move me. It's a bare-bones story of a revolutionary in 1950s Zanzibar, then still a British "protectorate." Denge has recently reappeared in Zanzibar after being away in Europe, studying presumably communist theory. He's just being a nuisance, distributing red single page flyers. The absurdity of trying to persuade Zanzibaris with the words of Lenin and Stalin is not lost in him.
Denge connects with Yasmin, who has recently fled her forced marriage to a man three times her age. Their different ethnicities reveal the interesting history of Zanzibar as an international crossroads. The British once administered it from India, and prior to that it was part of an Omani…
Wanted to love it and it never really sucked me in. The main love story asked for my investment without ever earning it. I was intrigued by the historical aspects, but again never got enough to hook me. Fell flat for me, despite some nice cinematography.
Really fascinating setting and era which made me realize - once again - how many chapters in global history I know nothing about. I really loved the cinematography and art direction. I struggled a little engaging with the main relationship and the character development. It felt like we were thrown into the middle of a relationship and the lives of characters that I didn’t know enough about, and by the time the backstory came I already felt a little bit confused. I’m wondering if a familiarity with the book would shed some light on the storytelling choices. Either way, I’m definitely inspired to learn more about Tanzania and Zanzibar’s histories as a result of watching this.
A film that almost intentionally perhaps refuses to be fully embraced, but by God I'm gonna like it for the more reasons that make it exceptional.
Now aesthetically the film's palette goes without saying, but at first it maybe a contrasting choice to project a more urgent narrative of subversive revo-action and a region specific interracial love affair, that may counter at times with the lusciously pristine images, and lushful tone, soothing themselves in an enigmatic mood, and the stylized manner that chooses to present itself in, so Souleymane Cissé this is not.
But early on when Yasmin (Ikhlas Gafur Vora) gets slapped by her husband and she in return hits him back with a solid clenched fist, she's deciding…
This is filled with measured momentary editing and cinematography reminiscent of In The Mood For Love, but the messy and tired structural editing, creating unnecessary complexity for its own sake in the first act, lets it down. The film gets better as it goes, blossoming into an anti-Imperialist story of star-crossed lovers and dogged resistance. The relationship between Denge and Yasmin is clearly the centrepiece of the film, but is underdeveloped and slightly dispassionate as a result. They could have used a few more scenes interacting to really sell Yasmin's turn to Communist sympathiser.
Overall it just struggles to justify the full runtime, feeling padded in places and rushed in others.
Amil Shivji directs a 90 minute drama starring Gudrun Columbus Mwanyika and Siti Amina, about a young African man in the 50s who was influenced by left wing ideas in Europe, is unhappy with the state of things in 50s Tanzania.
Now, don't look at me like that, I wasn't much that aware of this particular country and its history, and I've a feeling Amil Shivji had the idea of introducing the west in a in and out, direct way the history of his homeland.
And so watching this I go, a comrade from anywhere is another comrade.
Makes me think of a more low key and less tragic Sambizanga which is nothing to complain about.
Smart choice for that…
