Series Sudan Trilogy by Arthur Howes, 1
Director Arthur Howes, Amy Hardie
Country/Production UK
Release 1979
Length 53 mins
Format Colour / DVD / PAL / All region
Location Sudan / Africa
Ethnic Group Nuba
Prizes/Commendations Commendation Basil Wright Film Prize 1990
Comments Special rate for all three films 3 for 2
Order No RAI-200.269
Sale Info See Film Prices General Collection; not for sale in Africa and USA;
Hire Info See Film and Video Hire
Shot in 1989, Kafi's Story captures Nuba life at the moment before it was engulfed in the Sudanese civil war. Kafi narrates his own story into a portable tape record as he travels from his village, Torogi, to Khartoum to earn enough money to buy a new dress for his second wife, Tete. Kafi is quite consciously negotiating his own path between modernity and tradition.
Kafi and the other Nuba react to the presence of the camera with neither awe nor apprehension; they seem to welcome the camera as an extension of their open, out-going, hospitable lifestyle. At the same time, they rapidly become sophisticated about the way film conventions can frame reality. When a friend walks away from a shot, they joke that he is walking into the screen. At the film's end Kafi asks the filmmaker for one thing: a camera of his own.
