Black Girl (La Noire de…)

Dir. Ousmane Sembène. 1966, 80 mins. Digital projection. With Mbissine Thérèse Diop. In French with English subtitles. Racism, colonial oppression, and injustice were recurring themes for Senegalese author Ousmane Sembène, who turned from literature to cinema in the 1960s to reach a broader audience. Mbissine Thérèse Diop plays Diouna, a black nanny to a French family. Initially lured by a more glamorous life (symbolised by second-hand fashion received from her boss and a promise of a shopping trip), she is brought from Dakar to the south of France, into the alien world of an airless apartment where memories of her heritage are played out against the backdrop of a repressive world ruled by status and race. Sembène’s first feature film, Black Girl received much critical attention and won the prestigious Grand Prix Jean Vigo