Kinshasa Makambo
Christian, Ben and Jean-Marie are activists struggling for political change and free elections in their country, the Democratic Republic of the Congo. But the incumbent President refuses to relinquish power. How can the course of events be changed? Must they join forces with the opposition leader and his powerful party? Is dialogue still possible or must they resign themselves to a popular uprising which brings with it the risk of casualties? Kinshasa Makambo immerses us in the battle these three activists are engaged in—a battle that neither bullets, nor prison, nor exile seems able to stop.
Dieudo Hamadi was born in Kisangani (Democratic Republic of the Congo) in 1984, and studied medicine in 2005-2008. He then attended several documentary workshops. Hamadi is the author of two short documentaries, Ladies in Waiting and Zero Tolerance that caught the attention of festivals in Europe (Berlin, Paris, and Amsterdam) and North America (Toronto). Ladies In Waiting received the Pierre and Yolande Perrault scholarship at Cinema du Réel (Paris) in 2009. In 2013, Atalaku, his first feature-length documentary about the 2011 election campaign in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, won the Joris Ivens award for best first film, Best Foreign Film at the San Diego Black Film Festival (USA), the Jury Prize at FIDADOC (Agadir, Morocco) and three other awards. In 2014, National Diploma received both the International Prize of the SCAM and the Potemkin award at Cinéma du Réel (France), and was selected at TIFF (Toronto) and nearly 60 festivals worldwide. In 2015, Mama Colonel, his latest film, received assistance in post-production from the Sundance Institute and IDFA Bertha Fund.