Adieu Afrique

Poachers mindlessly killing game for fun and profit. Hands being chopped off a la Colonial Congo. Arabs being massacred on mass during the Zanzibar revolution. Simba rebels killing and being executed in return. White mercenaries fighting in the Congo.

All of these things, and many more, are followed by this classic Mondo film. It's flawed (its narrative is shamelessly colonialist, avoiding all the atrocities that the colonizers committed and the actual causes for nationalism that led to these tragedies), but this is Heart of Darkness for the film generation: It is a glimpse into the worst that Africa has to offer, and nobody comes out looking good.

Highly recommended, if you got the stomach to watch some of the most senseless butchery ever recorded on film. If only these guys had done Vietnam.

I watched this film last month and I was blown away. In the documentary form, some film makers use a narrator while others let the subjects tell the story in their own words. This film uses bold and dynamic cinematography to tell this gripping and sadly true tale in a way more powerful than any other narrative format. This movie was filmed using a variety of 16mm and 35mm motion pictures cameras. Virtually all of the shots are hand held and I was not surprised to later learn the the Director of Photography was awarded an Oscar for one of his previous works. I spent the summer of 2002 touring Africa and I stayed in a few of the locations shown in this film. I was amazed to see the splendor of the cities in this film which stood in stark contrast to the squalid ruins I witness less than forty years after this masterpiece was made. It was amazing to see how beautiful and vibrant these areas once were. Now it's a wasteland were life is both short and very cheap. This film is pure genius. It also represents a cautionary tale to other peoples of what can happen when the political and economic stability of a society dissipates. Also, one can't help but realize the severe consequences visited upon those naive souls who traded their prosperity, freedoms and security with the avid encouragement of those lefty do-gooders who led them down the path of ruin in the name of "casting away the chains of imperialism." After the continent imploded, these would be social engineers disappeared in the dark of night returning to their homes in London, New York and Paris to see what other societies they could ruin with their idealogical snake oil. They, by default, left to other the impossible task of cleaning up their mess.

The democracy our hapless African brothers and sisters thought they would receive never materialized and when their paternalistic European guardians left, most of these people suffered under the most brutal forms totalitarianism, crime, starvation and tribal genocide. They jumped blindfolded from their frying pans and landed in the fire. Would anyone dare say they are better off today then they were forty years ago? Food for thought.

This just aired on the small (digital) "culture" channel here in Finland. I am not sure whether this was the censored or the uncensored version - if this was the censored one I don't even want to think about what might be in the uncensored version.

Very very very impressive photography and - above all - editing. It *is* in parts very gruesome (esp. animal lovers should be prepared for some depictions of mindless cruelty) - but it also shows beautiful things, black, white, animal and floral.

That this is hard to come by today I can understand, it is just impossible politically incorrect (and must have been so at the time too). The makers of this movie seem to sympathise with everyone and no-one

Both terrifying and fascinating are the words that sprang up in my mind as I was watching the movie.

It's fascinating that the record of atrocities made to humans and animals in Africa existed already in the sixties. Just as those atrocities were happening. Today, fifty years later, we are only made aware post festum that something like that was happening and happened, but it is like some distant point in the past. If you think Iraq war in the nineties was the first 'live' feed of (war) terror from the other side of the world, think again. And try to find this movie. The movie maybe is not 'live' feed in the most rigid sense of the word, but it is a contemporary document of something that shouldn't have happened. And, what is worse, is still happening today.

And terrifying? Well, you just have to see the movie.

Look, I get it. I know this film is-if not outright racist-from a decidedly colonial point of view. I know that shots in it are inaccurate or staged. I know that ten minutes of Africa Addio consists of women in bikinis bouncing on trampolines in slow motion. I get it.

But there are so many scenes from this film that stick with me.

In one, two jeeps race through the Savana with a rope tied between them. They are using the rope to mow down a heard of galloping Zebra. It is shocking, even in the age of Youtube. And yet, at the same time, it is beautifully filmed. It is horrible and yet you can't stop watching.

Honestly, Mondo Cane 1+2 along with Africa Addio have some of the best cinematography of the 1960s. The colors, framing, and composition is sublime. And I love how they play around various effects such as zooms and fisheye lenses. Many shots are handheld, which gives them an intimacy that feels very modern. Almost all Mondo spin offs got this wrong. They thought they could just toss together some uninspired shots of sex and gore. Africa Addio has sex and gore, but it makes its sex and gore into art.

Another scene in the film shows the aftermath of what is today known as the Zanzibar Revolution. From a helicopter, we see a compound full of people waving for help. The next day, we return. Now the compound is full of bodies. I've seen the aftermath of genocides in the news but this felt different. The before and after. The non-BBC style narration. It felt more authentic in some strange way. It's crazy that these shots are some of the only photographic evidence of the genocide. It's crazy that such an event was only captured by a Mondo film.

Africa Addio is undoubtably an achievement. This film managed to capture select glimpses of a world that no longer exists. And it did so in a beautiful way. Today we can overlook much of what was once considered most shocking in the film and see it as a unique work of art.

And yet, it must be said that Africa Addio is also a dangerous film. I know that the film's narrative, combined with its many powerful visual, could easily reenforce racist views. The film is dangerous if for no other reason than there's far, far more to Africa than what it presents. For this reason, I personally do not think of it as a documentary even though it consists of real footage.

I can only recommend Africa Addio to film buffs. For would be connoisseurs of exploration like myself, it is a true gem. If however you are just searching for a fun watch-or worse, looking for a documentary-look elsewhere.