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Xala Movie Review

Xala is a 1975 Senegalese drama film directed by Ousmane Sembene. It is not among this director’s best works.

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“All men are the same. They’re all bastards“

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Senegal has finally won independence from France and the white members of the Chamber of Commerce have been thrown out. The people’s revolution of “African Socialism” begins as the black businessmen fill those empty seats, only to take enormous bribes that ensure the whites will secretly remain in power. One of these businessmen celebrates by marrying a third wife, but on the day of the wedding he finds he’s contracted the curse of Xala, rendering him impotent.

Senegalese cinema is the oldest within Sub-Saharan Africa. Ousmane Sembene is their most accomplished filmmaker and one of Africa’s best-regarded filmmakers. I loved his ‘Moolaade’, but this one failed to connect with me for a number of reasons. It’s one of those movies that are much more interesting to read about than to watch as the pacing is too slow and the movie’s uneventful nature made it rather difficult to get invested in.

Sembene’s directing is excellent as always and there are shades of French New Wave here and those more comedic and cinematic moments really worked. The editing, acting and script are all pretty good, but the problem is that even though it deals with very important themes, it failed to make a more memorable and more urgent tone to accompany those themes.

Dealing with African dependence on Europe and the corruption that plagued these newly liberated countries, Xala is very honest at tackling these problems that plague the entire continent while being particularly effective at juxtaposing the clash between traditionalism and modernism that erupted in the latter half of the twentieth century.

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The female characters are much more interesting than the male ones and the inclusion of witchcraft was quite intriguing and that magical realist element gave a lot of fresh quality to the otherwise straightforward dramatic movie. The comedic touches also worked as did the effortlessly grounded, sophisticated dialogue. I just wish that the overall plot and characterization were better crafted.