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A Brief History of Sudanese Cinema

mustafa mudathir a.
mailto:[email protected]@gmail.com
2014 / 9 / 26

Sudanese cinema production was started in 1949 as a Film Unit, a British device applied to all colonies with the overt aim of telling the story of War and to enlighten British citizens of its effects. Covertly, it was the vehicle for deploying stereotypes as a strategy.The Film Unit was also used to disseminate instructional policies on health issues, etc. Subsequently the Unit s production was employed in recording national occasions and in producing music entertainment shorts that were shown in mobile cinema projections to people in villages but they were also enjoyed by city-dwellers.
Two names were prominent as cinema technicians hired to run the Film Unit: Gadalla Gubara and Kamal M. Ibrahim. In 1974 Gubara left the unit to set his own private studio. This marked the failure of government management of cinema and ushered in private investment. In 1970, Kuwaiti filmmaker Khaled Siddiq coproduced with the Sudan Film Unit a film based on a famous novel by Sudanese novelist elTayib Salih, Urs Azain.
Then came a huge stalemate mainly attributed to the fact that Sudanese cinema, being one of the least developed in Africa, was rarely discussed either by the government bodies concerned nor by the public.
Gubara, partially aided financially by the government, produced in 1982 the first all-Sudanese long feature Tajooje which he claimed to have made in the Stanley Kramer s way of -dir-ecting. In fact Gubara had some film education in the States and had earned a Delta, Kappa, Alpha certificate of appreciation from the university of South California in 1961. He was also one of the -dir-ectors of the prestigious African film festival FESPACO (festival panAfricain du cinema du Ouagadougou).
But there were other more influential players in Sudanese filmmaking.
Critically acclaimed Hussein Sheriffe made "The Throwing of Fire" in 1973 out of the calendar discussed above. It was a documentary that was much appraised. He then followed up with a docu-mentary masterpiece "The Dislocation of Amber" in 1975 and then "Tigers Are Better Looking" adapted from a short story by Jean Rhys of Dominica and produced by at Beaconsfield Studios, UK.
Haunted by the meager infrastructure of the film industry in Sudan many of those who were trained as cinema technicians, according to Russia-trained cinematographer Sulieman M. Ibrahim, either resorted to the comforting idea of a would-be independent moviemaking´-or-they departed the country.
As an example of those who opted to quit the cinema making scene, AbdulRahman Najdi supervises cinema theaters in one of the Gulf countries. Another one, Ali Adlan runs a theater in a Canadian city. Ibrahim Shaddad had no different alienation. After residing in Canada for years and having tried digital filmmaking which, apparently he did not like, he went back to Sudan.
Shaddad has more fame in the circles of cinema making and criticism. His film (Insan) has won him an international prize as well as meaningful exposures to Canadian, European and African media makers."

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