Wend Kuuni

This is a wonderful film about a young boy who is found abandoned outside a village by a traveling trader. The trader takes the boy to the nearest village and he is lovingly raised by a family as their own son. The boy has been struck mute by trauma he experienced in his childhood and we witness his adaptation to his new life and the development of an intense friendship between the boy and his adoptive sister. The film has a lot to say about gender relationships, youth and the power of love to heal past trauma.

Wend Kuuni gives an interesting slice of life in a traditional West African society. The film was made in Upper Volta (now Burkina Faso) so I assume that's where it is set. The plot is ostensibly about a mute boy who is adopted. He was traumautized into muteness after he and his mother were chased out of their old village because she was thought to have been a witch. She died of exhaustion (literally) and he was found by a traveller who took him to another village. He is unable to communicate any of his past for a long time but while walking in a field at night, he views a corpse hanging from a tree and that stuns him into speech. The story was ok, but its forte was more in the presentation of very traditional life and customs in this West African country. It has a very slow, meandering pace to it, much like the culture itself. Not a chef d'oeuvre, but interesting nonetheless.