Taafe Fanga

Taafé fanga is the film version of a Mali folk tale. The well-known griot Sidiki Diabaté is our guide through the cliff rocks of Bandiagara and through the past of the Dogon people. When the Albarga, the mask of the local spirits and also symbol of power, falls into the hands of the young woman Yayémé, this causes chaos in Yanda. The women exchange their skirts for the trousers of the men. Is it a curse? A divine punishment? The women take over power, but will the new order be able to resist all its inherent contradictions?Adama Drabo: 'About thirteen years ago, I heard on the radio a professor who was talking about the cosmogony of the Dogon and described this particular moment from history. I ran to the library and read everything I could about it. Six months later I had written the play. In filming it I have tried to create something timeless, something that could happen in an African village five hundred years ago or the day after tomorrow. To do justice to the mood of the fable, I decided that a griot should lead the story and not myself.'Drabo, whose feature début Ta Dona travelled the world with great success, managed to set up this social satire, notable for its narrative and cultural wealth, with the aid of the 'good fairies' Andrée Daventure and Claude Le Gallou, and with support from e.g. European funds and the ZDF.