Filmmaker Joël Karekezi: "I believe in this Mobile Film Festival Africa"
Rwandan director Joël Karekezi (here in 2019) is a member of the jury of the Mobile Film Festival Africa 2021. © Issouf Sanogo / AFP
Text by: Siegfried Forster Follow
7 mins
“I really like the 1 Mobile - 1 Minute - 1 Film concept.
The first pan-African selection of the Mobile Film Festival Africa invites us until March 17 to discover for free the films of 51 young directors from 23 African countries, in the running for the Africa Grand Prix, endowed with 10,000 euros.
Interview with Rwandan director Joël Karekezi, winner of the prestigious Yennenga Gold Standard at Fespaco and member of the jury of the Mobile Film Festival Africa 2021.
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: After your triumph at Fespaco 2019, at the largest pan-African film festival, we expected you more in a jury of Fespaco, the Cannes Film Festival or the Venice Mostra than the Mobile Film Festival Africa online.
What motivated you to participate as a member of the jury
?
Joël Karekezi
:
I was not a member of the jury in Venice, Cannes or Fespaco, but at the Carthage Film Festival (JCC) and at other festivals.
I accepted to be a member of the jury at the Mobile Film Festival Africa, because I really like the concept.
The fact that young people shoot one-minute films with a telephone.
Thus, they can prove their thirst for making cinema and the festival will accompany them and give prizes to help them in the production of their short films.
"The future today", by Nathanaël Minoungou © Nathanaël Minoungou
In everyday life, filming with the cell phone has become commonplace, there are even great filmmakers like Jafar Panahi, Michel Gondry or Steven Soderbergh who have made films with a smartphone. You yourself, self-taught, you trained, among other things, with an online film school to become a filmmaker, have you ever made a film with a smartphone
?
I haven't made a film with a phone yet, but when I started out, this digital world allowed me to shoot.
My first feature film, I made it with digital cameras and a small budget, so I was able to prove that I could do it.
Me, I believe that even if we film with a telephone, if we have a beautiful story to tell, it is the beginning.
Afterwards, it helps to get funding to shoot a film with professional equipment.
For that, I believe in this Mobile Film Festival.
It motivates people to work and tell their stories.
It also helps them afterwards.
At the festival, all the prizes awarded will be dedicated to the production.
MOBILE FILM FESTIVAL AFRICA © DR
In 2019, when you received the
Yennenga
Gold Standard from Fespaco in Ouagadougou for your film The Mercy of the Jungle , you said
: “
The message of the film is simple
: our Africa is beautiful.
We must continue to develop and live in peace
.
»Is the Mobile Film Festival Africa part of this journey
?
I have already watched a few short films and what touches me a lot is that there are films from many African countries and each film has a lot to tell.
There are subjects that really touch me a lot.
I think we have to give young people the means and possibilities to try to tell these stories, because this is our Africa and it is about telling our stories, whatever the means.
On the festival site, you can discover the films in competition until March 17. They come from all over Africa
: Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Egypt, Nigeria, Kenya, DRC, Togo, South Africa ... there are both funny films and very serious stories, and even in technical level they display ambitions: tracking shots, close-ups, low dives ... Without naming a particular film, what has struck you the most so far
?
At the moment, I cannot comment.
What I can say is that through the phone, these young people really got involved in this contest and tried to tell stories that touch them.
That speaks to me a lot.
“André”, by Nguissaly Barry (Senegal) © Nguissaly Barry
This is the first edition of the Mobile Film Festival Africa. Among the 497 films from 38 African countries sent, 51 films were selected. They talk about the future, the misery of education for the poor in Africa, the dream of a better life, of freedom ... According to you, such an initiative, what can it change for the cinema in Africa
?
Often, festivals are times of celebration, but if a festival also tries to invest in supporting projects, that can change things.
It can help young people to get involved in cinema and to produce a lot.
For me, a festival is not only the time to celebrate or to present projects that we already have, but also the time to plan new projects for the future.
What is your new project in this era marked by the Covid-19 pandemic
?
I am in the process of defining the criteria for my next feature film.
It is a true story, based on the life of a Senegalese, Captain Mbaye Diagne, who was in Rwanda in the years 1994 as part of the United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda.
He was a soldier.
By the time the genocide began, the UN was leaving the country and there were massacres everywhere.
But he, even if he was Senegalese under the command of the UN, he decided, as an individual, to save lives, without means.
He saved over six hundred people, unarmed, with negotiations, with words.
And he sacrificed his life.
He was assassinated in Rwanda.
This story, I will tell it very soon.
“Africans we are” (Togo), by Franck Awussikpo © Franck Awussikpo
►
Mobile Film Festival Africa, until March 17.
The closing ceremony and the awards ceremony -
including the Africa Grand Prix endowed with
10,000 euros
- will take place on March 23, 24 and 25 in Tunis, accompanied by a master class and film screenings.
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