Primitive considerations

The winner of the Jury Prize at the 1987 Cannes Film Festival, Yeelen is the acclaimed fourth feature of director Souleymane Cissé. The story of a confrontation between a young man and his father, Yeelen is a challenging representative of African film whose success has grown steadily since its release and whose resulting reputation has earned it the right to be commended as the leading exponent of African cinema.

The film tells the story of a son's journey to gain the mystical powers necessary to fight his father, a wicked sorcerer who is on a quest to find and kill his son. Soma, the father, is fearful of the supernatural power that his son, Nianankoro, has inherited from him, and so attempts to summon the destructive forces of the gods to help him find Nianankoro and destroy him, heralding the conflict between young and old, good and evil which sustains Yeelen throughout

The challenge that Yeelen presents to the viewer is one that exceeds the confines of the cinema: quite plausibly, the action on screen will highlight in its narrative and setting a viewer's ignorance of other cultures. At the very least, the style of Yeelen presents something so unfamiliar — in story, theme and cultural background — such that the viewers are constantly searching their knowledge for a hook on which to hang an opinion. Where Hollywood offers little aside from familiar surroundings and known culture, so Yeelen transports us not only to a different place but to a different civilisation altogether.

It is worth pursuing these differences: if comparisons are made between familiar, western movies and Yeelen, it is easy to see the latter in terms of what it is not. It does not have a strong, easily traceable narrative; it does not have a star; it does not seem to have tremendous production — either on set or in post production; it does not have an obvious musical theme; it cares little for etiquette and it has never had grand studio promotion. In short, everything expected of a typically successful western film is in short supply.

It is natural to ask: how much are these apparent losses the result of the viewer's lack of familiarity? Judging by critical reaction, the film's obliquity in its cultural foundations has caused confusion. Though rightly praising the rich imagery, effortless cinematography and its lively portrait of Bambara culture, many critics have questioned Yeelen on the strength of its narrative structure and associated problems, citing those occasions on which scenes are not clearly sequential or their significance is left unexplained. Thus, the film's method of storytelling is deemed "faulty" and "uneven"; others go so far as to call it "primitive" or "crude". But is this the fault of the film itself or of the viewer watching the film? The same viewer may have little familiarity with townships in 1950s Japan or the desert of New Mexico, but the structure of Ikiru or 21 Grams wouldn't be described as "primitive". Does this suggest that the African film Yeelen, despite its visual flourishes and carefully constructed rhythm, nonetheless lacks the formal sophistication of films from other countries? This question of sophistication haunts the viewer, who is never quite sure where the fault lies: with the film or with them.

Thus, the production values and a lack of familiarity challenges the viewer by posing the above question and many related ones: does a viewer implicitly expect less from a film because it was made outside traditional Hollywood (read: western) values? Or put another way: does one subconsciously judge Yeelen according to different standards, much as an adult, say, may judge the work of a teenager as compared to a fellow adult? These are provocative — and by association sensitive — questions to ask.

Technically, there seems little justification in considering the film "primitive", containing as it does stunning cinematography by Jean-Michel Humeau and Jean-Noel Ferragut, whilst directing is arguably Africa's greatest film director, Souleymane Cissé. Born in 1940, Cissé began his film career as a projectionist and photographer in Mali. After seven years studying cinema in the Soviet Union, Cissé returned to Mali, making newsreels and documentaries and applying his new skills. His first fiction film, Cinq Jours d'une Vie (Five Days in a Life, 1972), launched his career and garnered critical attention for the burgeoning African film movement that was taking shape. Three years later, Cissé directed the first feature film in his native language of Bambara, The Girl, only to have the film banned by authorities. Constantly struggling for state funding and the opportunity to make pictures the way he saw them, Yeelen would only come to Cissé some fifteen years after his banned feature.

In creating his masterpiece, Cissé seems to have adapted the way of storytelling that has been preserved in the oral traditions of Mali. As with any folklore, the story of Yeelen draws from a complex tradition which, though full of resonance and meaningful implication, is not wholly assimilable into Western interpretive language — further proof of the difficulties with which a western audience might view the picture. That the film remains accessible, though, is an indication of Cissé's ability to realise his culture and its stories on film, as well as a celebration of his skills as a director alone.

Putting the cultural differences aside, the subject matter of Yeelen in itself is challenging, for it is a story of cosmogony: an account of the origins of the universe. It begins with the image of the rising sun — literally, the dawn of time — and ends with the ultimate symbol of life. The rises and falls between these respective dawns reveals a process of regeneration, both in the genealogical meaning and in the sense of a rising from the ruins; it is a complete passage through time to rival the smooth manipulations of Kubrick's earlier Space Odyssey. More than this, though, Yeelen is a lasting representative of the diversity and power of film, a fitting and transcendental testament to the common tradition that binds different cultures together: the desire to tell stories and have them preserved throughout the ages for others to appreciate and learn from.