Dance With the Wodaabe

France
91′33″, 2010.
DIRECTED BY
PRODUCED BY
Sandrine Loncke
CINEMATOGRAPHER
Charlotte Krebs, Sandrine Loncke
EDITED BY
Sandrine Loncke
CONTACT
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In the heart of the Nigerien Sahel, far off the beaten “asphalt” track, thousands of Fulbe Wodaabe nomads gather every year for a gigantic ceremony named the Geerewol. For seven full days and nights, following the solar cycle, two lineages are opposed in a genuine ritual war, their only weapons being song and dance. The stakes of war, the clear challenge: stealing women. The ultimate purpose: to break in peace after having mutually expressed recognition of cultural conformity. According to the Wodaabes, giving up these ceremonies – the only gathering where community links are woven – would entail their dissolution as an original cultural entity. But the ecological crisis striking Sahel makes the organization of such gatherings more and more difficult.As a result of ten years' research and friendship, the film is based on an active listening of the ritual's protagonists: fearing that the tradition may die out, they chose to tell us their experiences and their understanding of the event. Their words gradually shed a whole new light on the ritual and sumptuous choreographic cycle that plays out before our eyes.