Niger: Magic and Ecstasy in the Sahel (2005)
A celebration of life in the Sahel region of Africa, this film showcases many of Niger’s venerable music styles. Tuareg Electric Guitar trance rock, Bori cult dance ceremonies, Fulani Folk, and Roadhouse Gospel Rave-ups are some of the segments included in this latest "Folk Cinema" classic from Sublime Frequencies! Filmed in December of 2004 on location in Niger, Hisham Mayet delivers a spontaneous, raw, and inspiring collection of images, music, and ceremony (again with a single camera presentation) from a nation mired in poverty and continual post-colonial disappointment. Quoting from Mayet’s liner notes: "This is not music as commodity, this is music as survival. There is a saying in Niger that goes, "when we die we know we are going to heaven because we already live in Hell" well I think its more like the purgatory that we all live in and they sure have managed to transcend with an incredible natural resource: Music. Dig it!"
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The Age of Commercialism
It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.
The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful
The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.