BFF: The Ballad of Suzanne Césaire

BBFC Ratingf-rated FilmBFF: The Ballad of Suzanne Césaire

Showing: 04 November 2024

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Mon 4 Nov 2024

CertificateNot Rated
Year2024
GenreDrama
Director(s)Madeleine Hunt Ehrlich
Writer(s)Madeleine Hunt Ehrlich, Marina Magloire
LanguageIn French and English with English subtitles
CountryUSA
Running Time1HR 15MINS
Extra InfoPart of Belfast Film Festival
SeasonBelfast Film Festival

An actress grapples with the legacy of the real-life figure she's supposed to be playing: the Martinique writer Suzanne Césaire.

Director Madeleine Hunt-Ehrlich's background in visual art is evident throughout her feature debut, not only in the rich evocation of lush and verdant mid-century Martinique, but in the Brechtian playfulness with which she approaches the story of Suzanne Césaire, whose own work as a key anti-colonialist thinker and pioneer of the Afro-surrealism movement was overshadowed by that of her poet-politician husband, Aimé Césaire.

Reclaiming Suzanne (Zita Hanrot) from history's neglect is a project complicated by Césaire's own desire to evade the limelight even while she interacted with some of the most famous intellectuals of her time, which Hunt-Ehlich turns to her film's advantage, allowing her actors to both play their characters and play themselves reflecting on and connecting with those characters, making this ballad into a lovely trick of light that honors Césaire's legacy without robbing it of any of its mystery.

For information on the full BFF24 programme visit: www.belfastfilmfestival.org 

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