Soul Boy

Hawa Essuman | Germany, Kenya | 2010 | 60' |

| IFFR 2010

You could say that the location is the real protagonist of this film. All African cities have enormous and often depressing slums, but the Kibera district in Nairobi can hardly be called a district at all. It’s a muddy ocean of slums in which more than one million people live and battle for survival.
Abila (14) lives in the violent slum jungle of Kibera. He is a Luo – one of the many Kenyan tribes. He is mad about Shiku, who is the same age, but she is a Kikuyu, and that is the problem. Boys and girls from different tribes are not encouraged to mix. But Abila has another problem too. At the start of the film, he finds his father in a disturbing state. His mother says it’s a hangover, but Abila has the feeling there’s more going on. He finds out that his father’s soul has been stolen by a Nyawawa, a female spirit. Despite the hostility of the surroundings, Abila and Shiku set off together to save the soul of Abila’s father.
The film emerged from a workshop situation, and production support by the famous German director Tom Tykwer gave the film a very professional look. Above all, the camera work is of a level that is seldom seen in African pictures. The authentic background in combination with the European support, also from the Hubert Bals Fund, turned Soul Boy into a sparkling short film.

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