Mame Woury Thioubou: "5 étoiles", un récit sur la désillusion de l’exil | a story about the disillusionment of exile: Analyse/Analysis de/by Fatou Kiné Sène

UPDATE: FESPACO 2021 - Competition

Documentary - Short

 

Mame Woury Thioubou: "5 étoiles", un récit sur la désillusion de l’exil |  a story about the disillusionment of exile: Analyse/Analysis de/by Fatou Kiné Sène

Source : aps.sn

Version originale en Français : http://aps.sn/actualites/culture/cinema/article/5-etoiles-de-mame-woury-thioubou-un-recit-sur-la-desillusion-de-l-exil

5 Etoiles by Mame Woury Thioubou (2019)

Tanit de bronze | Bronze Tanit

Tunisia, Oct 31 (APS) - The short film 5 Étoiles by the Senegalese Mame Woury Thioubou, screened Wednesday at the City of Culture in Tunis, as part of the 2019 edition of the Journées Cinématographiques de Carthage (JCC, 26 October-2 November), deals with "the disillusionment of exile", subtly bringing emigrants to realise their own precariousness in order to better talk about the issue.

The film highlights the lives of African migrants in Lille, France in order to bring these "undocumented migrants" to the realisation that after braving the desert and the sea to arrive in France, Europe is only the beginning of their ordeal.

"The film does not tell young Africans not to leave, but what I want them to know" is that Europe "is not going to be the end of the ordeal, that it is the beginning of a new struggle," said the director.

Mame Woury Thioubou had always wondered about the motivation of these young people who choose to leave the African continent for the West. Her cinematographic approach, hence, leads her on an inquiry into these young migrants' journey through the Sahara desert—for those leaving from Mali or Guinea.

Obviously, she evokes the horrors suffered by migrants from the Libyan route evident by the difficult experience of crossing the Mediterranean.

Far from knowing the epilogue of this ordeal once in Europe, in reality, it is only the beginning.

The director gives pride of place to the protagonists of the film who make a self-analysis of their precarious situation. Her camera insists on the faces, the feet, but especially their "5 Étoiles (tr. star), an old insanitary factory, a squatting place for the migrants.

Mame Woury relates their difficult living conditions in their struggle for "dignity" in the face of ordinary racism and daily humiliation.

The subject also reveals, through its reference to history, by way of a reminder that the issue of migration is not a new subject and has marked and transformed the lives of all human societies.

Mame Woury Thioubou illustrates this point with a focus on the statue of Faidherbe, one of the architects of colonisation in Senegal, and who in Lille is seen as a positive figure celebrated at the Republic Square, in this French metropolis where the "sans-papers" (the undocumented) rally each week.

Through this approach the director also challenges the French, inviting them to look in the mirror.

"This movement by these migrants, Faidherbe has already done by coming to our country without authorisation. Yet today, when our young people want to go to the West, barriers are imposed on them. I also want the French to see themselves and to question themselves,” says the director.

Biography | Biographie

Mame Woury Thioubou was born and raised in Senegal. After a MA in geography at the University Cheikh Anta Diop in Dakar and a diploma in journalism at the University of St. Louis, Senegal. She is a journalist/reporter at the newspaper "Quotidien" and for the company Avenir Communication, and technical assistant for Programme Agenda 21 in the city of Matam.

In 2009, she decided to return to her studies continuing in the area of journalism but from a more artistic approach by engaging in creative documentary filmmaking, now considered a genre in itself. She enrolled in the Master II Réalisation de Documentaire de Création  (Creative Documentary Filmmaking) at the University Gaston Berger in St. Louis (Senegal), under the tutelage of Africadoc.

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Mame Woury Thioubou est née et a grandi au Sénégal. Après une maîtrise de géographie à l’Université Cheikh Anta Diop de Dakar et l’obtention d’un diplôme en Journalisme à l’Université de Saint-Louis du Sénégal, elle devient Journaliste/reporter au “Quotidien”, pour la société Avenir Communication et assistante technique du Programme Agenda 21 de la Ville de Matam. 

En 2009, elle décide de reprendre ses études et complète son point de vue journalistique par une approche plus artistique en se lançant dans le documentaire de création, aujourd’hui considéré comme un genre cinématographique à part entière. Elle suit ainsi le Master II de Réalisation de Documentaire de Création à l’Université Gaston Berger de Saint Louis (Sénégal), formation sous la tutelle d’Africadoc.