128. Makala; movie review

MAKALA
Cert U
97 mins
BBFC advice: Contains no material likely to harm or offend

Here I am combining my business as a media consultant with a bit of movie blogging while perched on my comfortable bed in my nice warm house.
I probably earn as much in a year as Kabwita Kasongo earns in a lifetime and yet he works a heck of a lot harder.
Kabwita lives with his family in the Congolese countryside and earns money by cutting down trees, creating charcoal, literally pushing sacks of it, perched on a bike, 50 kilometres to the city and selling it.
And he is not the only one. I have read that the deforestation caused by Kabwita and his countrymen is now having a significant environmental impact.
Director Emmanuel Gras decided to follow one of the charcoal tradesmen when seeing them struggling along the roads of the Congo.
Theirs is a perilous life, haggling with people over the price of a sack in a country where violence is rife.
Gras's movie sees Kabwita at home where is family eke out a very frugal existence and then concentrates on his journey to the city with his charcoal.
It is a very intimate picture of life in this central African country where ingenuity is needed just to survive.
Gras spent many months on the project to ensure that it has an authentic feel despite admitting that small elements are dramatised (I was left wondering how a camera would not prompt altered behaviour).
It is an enthralling sketch of a part of the world which is so remote that it could be on a completely different planet.
And Kabwita makes an ideal subject - hard-working and loyal to his family and his religion but not without a sense of humour.
However, I felt that, in common, with too many documentaries, it presumes knowledge.
Unless, I missed it I am not even sure that it reveals in which country the film is set (I found out by supplementary reading).
I also wanted to know more about Kabwita's family - their neighbours, their ambitions, their health issues (one of the children is sick) etc.
But documentary-makers appear so keen for fly-on-the-wall realism, they often forsake key elements of the full story which would be solved by adding a narrative.
Nevertheless, I would still recommend Makala.


Reasons to watch: A eye-opening view of real life in rural Africa
Reasons to avoid: It needs more background to understand its story

Laughs: None
Jumps: None
Vomit: None
Nudity: None
Overall rating: 7.5/10

Director's quote - Emmanuel Gras: "Kabwita genuinely struggles for his own life and for that of his beloved, he doesn’t look up to the sky for a miracle. He doesn’t have alternatives but to take an action, it’s his human condition."

The big question: How can we change the inequalities in the world?

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