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The Appropriate Tune - "Soul Makossa" by Manu Dibango
We’ve been to South Africa with Coenie Dippenaar’s Revenge, and we visited Nigeria with Kenneth Gyang’s Confusion Na Wa, so how about a short trip to Cameroon next? Located around the center of Africa with one side opened up to the Atlantic Ocean, Cameroon’s position in the world has long made it a juicy target for those looking to expand their borders and their wallets (some of them weren’t even European), as well as a bastion of cultural and ecological diversity that is unheard of in many parts of the world. The veritable melting pot that you always hear about, and the thing about melting pots people always talk about is how it makes great art. That’s certainly true for Cameroon, which has a rich background in music and fashion, but as this is a film blog I think I’ll focus on Cameroonian film, and I believe I’ve found one.
Released in 2005, Les Saignantes was written and directed by Jean-Pierre Bekolo and produced by Bekolo, Lisa Crosato, Pascale Obolo, Adrienne Silvey, Michelle Gue, Jim Fink and Andre Bennett. It is the year 2025 in the city of Yaounde, and Majolie (Adèle Ado) has a problem: she’s a prostitute, just got done having weird acrobat sex with her client in fact, and in turns out he’s dead -- death by snu-snu. Even worse, it turns out the dead guy is actually the Secretary General of the Civil Cabinet, an important figure in the government of this vaguely dystopian future world. Majolie does what any normal person would do in this situation: take a shower, dump whiskey on her head and piss on the street, and then calls her friend Chouchou (Dorylia Calmel) for help. They decide the best course of action is to dispose of the body, which they make far more complicated than just dumping his ass at the docks, but take his car to do it, because apparently you can’t track vehicles in the future. Meanwhile the Minister of State is scheming about something, presumably to seize more power in this dystopian future government, but mostly he seems to want to have sex. Eventually these two things will converge and a greater plot will emerge, but probably not in the way you expect.
First off, I have to give credit to Bekolo for even attempting a science-fiction film. Despite the genre’s long history with B-movies it can be hard on the wallet, but Bekolo manages to make it work. A dab of futuristic tech to help set things up, but mainly using (or not using in this case) lighting and dialogue to build this gloomy atmosphere. It actually reminded me somewhat of Godard’s Alphaville, another sci-fi film which doesn’t rely on special effects to tell its story, although I think Les Saignantes establishes its future setting a bit clearer.
I also want to give credit to the cast here, who I thought did great work here. Given how much of this film was built on these ‘Bloodettes’ they really needed to shine, but I think Ado and Calmel have good chemistry together. Emile Abossolo M’bo is pretty fun as the Minister of State, every time he shows up he’s chewing the scenery to pieces, and he only gets crazier as the film goes on. The only one who seemed to be having trouble was the taxi driver character near the beginning who seemed to be subjected to numerous edits during his scene, and I couldn’t tell if this was a filmmaking choice on Bekolo’s part or him just cobbling together the best line reads he could find. Having watched the entirety of MST3K however, calling it ‘bad’ would be a stretch.
Just because you respect the effort that went into something doesn’t automatically mean you like it, and unfortunately that applies to The Bloodettes. Honestly I’m not really sure what Bekolo wanted to do in this movie. It starts off as a bit of a drama, turns into a dark comedy for a while, then it tries to do the future dystopia thing where the Bloodettes are the heroes (despite them not coming across as heroic or even empathetic towards other people at any point), while also attempting to be an erotic thriller and the word Mevoungou (which is everything and nothing and has no meaning but also has a meaning) is said more times then you will ever hear for the rest of your life and I don’t know man, by the end I wasn’t sure what the fuck was even going on or why anyone was doing anything. Also I think they were supposed to be vampires, hence the name referencing blood and why Chouchou’s extended family can turn invisible, but as it’s only actually relevant once in the entire film you’d be forgiven for thinking I just made up. No, it’s never explained why there are vampires in this otherwise grounded sci-fi setting.
The editing is its own set of hurdles. Les Saignantes came out in 2005, and it’s from the opening scene. The constant speed ups, slow downs, instant replays ad nauseum set to chill dance music, the dialogue scenes with more cuts than your average deli, it’s like being stuck in a cyberpunk video game cutscene. That’s not to say the grime-punk alt-rock look is bad, Doctor Who has been coasting off of it for two decades, but any aesthetic choice can age like milk when looked through a modern lens, and I think ultimately that’s where Saignantes trends.
Had the film committed to the gallows humor route that it was setting up at the beginning though I think it would have been an easy recommendation, because I think the atmosphere it was building up had that sort of Brazil feel, but as soon as it tries to be serious that all falls apart. Doing the whole ‘cut to a static screen with words on it’ thing, the time-tested staple of art films and all this stuff about political corruption and societal decay, to then have the characters break into a fight scene out of Buffy from out of nowhere, is pure cognitive dissonance on screen. A deeper meaning, if there still is one, is dissolved into an absurd, sexually charged soup.
So Les Saignantes is not an easy recommendation, but I wouldn’t say to dismiss, nor do I think it fits into the categories we typically associate with ‘so bad they’re good’ films. It’s just confusing. Maybe a bit pretentious, but mainly confusing. So if your curiosity is at all peaked I would suggest sitting down one evening, grabbing a big bowl of mevoungou and checking it out for yourself. You might not end up liking it in the end, but you certainly won’t be bored. Either way, I’m gonna go take a 365 year long nap.
HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!
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