I believe every aspiring or established African Filmmaker has had that question; how do I better portray my continent? Which story do I tell that captures the true essence of Africa?
The above question resurfaced after a long time once I stepped out of the documentary feature film, The Eyes of Ghana. The film follows Chris Hesse, the personal cameraman to revolutionary leader Kwame Nkrumah, the first president of Ghana, who was deposed in a coup d’état in 1966. Having saved over 1,000 rolls of film from Nkrumah’s enemies who sought to destroy them, Hesse, now in his 90’s, passes them on to a protégé, Anita Afonu, and together they attempt to hold a public screening of footage never seen in public before in Accra.
From minute one, this film moves one effortlessly with the Chris Hesse’s retelling of Ghana’s road to independence in a vibrant, but also vulnerable way, honestly and unbaisely capturing the highs of Kwame Nkurumah’s political career and the lows leading upto the coup d’état.
Being Kwame’s cameraman, Chris Hesse emphasizes on the importance of film not only to him and Kwame, but also to the continent of Africa. Think about it, how many African filmmakers have been and will be inspired by Chris’ documentation of Kwame’s journey and it’s emphasis of African unity?
Chris’ protege and the film’s producer, Anita Afonu, bridges the historical gap and represents every young African Filmmaker hungry and burning to capture Africa authentically, just like what Kwame Nkurumah aimed to do by recruiting Chris Hesse and creating film infrastructure in Ghana.
Beautifully shot, paced and edited, The Eyes of Ghana implements every technical trick in its book to move you through every second.
Can’t recommend this enough to every creative in our continent.
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