Banel & Adama could be summed up as a stylised version of Poe's The Tell-Tale Heart but set in a drought-stricken Senegalese village and with added cultural complications. It's very well-made, with real visual flair and a painterly eye; among the many stylistic touches, look out for the near-obligatory dolly zoom. Initially we sympathise with the main protagonist but her love story and character soon reveal themselves to be much darker than they appear. And there's the rub: there is a lot of actual cruelty and death inflicted on various animals, most of it by her as an outlet for her conflicted mental state, and I soon found myself losing all sympathy and willing the film to end. But it only gets worse.
In several long interviews posted on YouTube, the director talks about her wish for the film to be seen and appreciated internationally, to present a non-stereotyped view of her home country, different to that which most Westerners see in the news. But the abundant, wanton animal killings, which could easily have been faked or implied rather than seen, is an egregiously retrogressive choice and I don't understand why the film's many plaudits and distributors completely fail to mention it, especially in this supposedly more enlightened day and age. I can only ascribe it to a form of inverse racism, causing it to be excepted from the usual consensus that animal suffering in the name of so-called art is wrong and utterly indefensible.
Overall, despite the film's many excellent technical and storytelling qualities, it was a gruelling watch and by the end I hated myself for having stayed put and not walking out at the first sign of where it was headed.
