Malagasy

from imdb:
They were called fahavalo – enemies – because they rebelled in 1947 against French colonial authorities in Madagascar. Today, filmmaker Marie-Clémence Andriamonta Paes takes us where the events took place, on a journey to meet the last witnesses. They tell us about their fight for independence and their long months of resistance in the jungle, armed only with spears and talismans. When Malagasy soldiers came back from WWII, they expected de Gaulle to give them independence. Instead, they were asked to return to their indigenous status and provide unfree labour in coffee plantations. They soon organized an uprising, harshly repressed by the French and their heavy weaponry. They resisted for months though, with the help of shamans and their magic formulas. Through the mesmerizing music of Régis Gizavo, the dialogue between never seen archive footage from the 40’s and heartfelt testimonies makes us travel into a forgotten past. A journey into history, filmed today, along the railways, through the forest, from the Highlands to the East coast of Madagascar.Read More »

Synopsis:
Very Remby deals with the rural exodus, the return to the land, and the antagonism between two worlds, that of city-dwellers and that of rural people deeply rooted in tradition. Ranaivo lives in Tananarive. To make ends meet, he has to sell sorbets. His father, Ratovo, goes into town to consult his son. He asks him for financial help for the ceremony of turning over the dead. It’s after this ceremony in the village that Ranaivo decides to leave the city and emigrate to the highlands, where anything is still possible for those who want to return to the land.Read More »

In Toamasina, on the east coast of Madagascar, Saholy runs a small business of pedicabs. She takes care of her drivers as if they were her sons and lets them find with her a home where they get mothered. Tormented with a difficult past, Njaka is looking for his place in the bosom of this big family. At seventeen he knows he must decide his future but lets himself still easily be tempted by girls and smoking joints.Read More »

For Malagasy people who honor their ancestors, when the deceased are in the grave, their spirits are always alive and present, they maintain their individualities and their kinship connections. At Alasora, in the Central Highlands of Madagascar, Marie takes care of a royal tomb that was entrusted to her and welcomes visitors who have come to ask a favor from the ancestors.Read More »