Djibril Diop Mambéty

Djibril DIOP MAMBÉTY (1945, Senegal − 1998, France) was a Senegalese filmmaker, actor, orator, composer and poet. Despite his small oeuvre, he holds a legendary status within African Cinema. Besides being trained as an actor at the National Daniel Aorano Theatre in Dakar, he had no formal training in filmmaking. Diop Mambéty directed two short films before his first feature Touki Bouki (1973), for which he received the International Critics’ Prize at Cannes and the Special Jury Prize at Moscow Film Festival. It also gained him international acclaim for the unconventional cinematic technique and narrative style. Although more experimental than many of his African contemporaries, Diop Mambéty shared their use of the cinematic medium to comment on the political and social conditions in Africa.