Somali drama wins Pan-African film festival grand prize

Ouagadougou, October 24 (BNA) The entry into Somalia of “The Grave Digger’s Wife” by Somali-Finnish writer and director Khader Adiros Ahmed won the Stallion of Yenninga Grand Prize for Best Film at the African Film Festival in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso. Sunday.

The touching drama about a gravedigger’s struggle to raise money to pay for his wife’s surgery, earned him a prize of 20 million CFA francs ($35,714) and a statue of a golden stallion.

The film, which was Somalia’s first official entry in the Best International Feature Film category at the 2021 Academy Awards, premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in July.

Ahmed, who was not in Ouagadougou to receive his award, said earlier that the film was inspired by events that took place in his family.

Mauritanian film director Abderrahmane Sissako, who chaired the jury of the 17 feature films in the competition, said it is a brave film from a country that does not produce many films. “Whenever there is a movie like this out there, it should be encouraged,” according to Reuters.

“It is a beautiful film that tells a story about humanity. It is also a love story,” Sissako said after the ceremony, which was chaired by Senegalese President Macky Sall and Burkina Faso President Roch Marc Kabore.

The Pan-African Film and Television Festival of Ouagadougou, better known as Fespaco, is the largest biannual meeting of African cinema, which attracts international and African film and television professionals from the continent and diaspora to the capital of Burkina Faso.

This 27th edition has been postponed for nearly eight months to October 16-23, 2021, due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the security challenges the country is facing.

HF