Ethiopian Movie-Making Magic: Shuruba Cinema
Ethiopia has captured international attention for anthropological discoveries that date well into the ancient past and for the possibility of brokering peace in twenty-first century areas well-known for historical conflict. Africa is home to a population of more than 1.2 billion souls with diverse demographics. Africa is not a monolith, but it is driven by the beauty of unity, growth, and prosperity.
Teshome Gabriel, an Ethiopian film historian, brought us “Third Cinema” and revolutionized the way we look at cinema from developing countries. Hamid Naficy in dialogue with Professor Gabriel gave us “An Accented Cinema” as an opportunity to further contextualize movie-making from underrepresented regions. An accented cinema, which is a discourse about movies focusing on a cathected homeland, includes diasporic and exilic filmmaking. The accent is not on the characters in the film or the producers and directors, but an accent in the way film is used as a language.
In 2003, Salem Mekuria, a filmmaker and professor of Ethiopian origin, declared in an interview, “There is no Ethiopian national cinema to speak of.” Ethiopia’s burgeoning film industry has since exploded into a wide variety of options from East Africa due to the democratization of cinema arts. Not every movie from East Africa makes it to the big screen, but our smart phones and devices keep us abreast of many new releases. The minimal tools required to produce a video are economically within popular grasp, and the ability to spread a compelling message with social media has empowered many voices who identify as part of what once constituted an empire that formerly encompassed all of Africa.
My screenwriting professor in my undergraduate film career explained that the early history of cinema began as hieroglyphics on cave walls. The Nile River unites Egypt with Ethiopia, its neighbor. Who would have thought Egyptians were storyboarding so long ago? Ethiopian Orthodox Christians heavily rely on icons to communicate stories from the Bible. People prefer pictures and at one point in church history, the majority of Christians were illiterate, so depicting Biblical messages with paint bolstered faith when approaching actual texts was inaccessible.
The first film to be recorded and edited partly on an iPhone already appeared in the Cannes Film Festival. This is good news for the iPhone generation. More people have access to the technology necessary to produce feature-length fiction films and short videos. This is a historical shift in cinema where the subaltern will be seen and heard, possibly subtitled in English.
As an Ethiopian-American film student, I longed for representation of marginalized people. I am not fluent in Amharic, so I face a daunting task: to connect with my roots. Speaking of roots, here is my theory of Ethiopian cinema and why it relates to hair-braiding or shuruba in Amharic. Sewnetwa (Her Body) is a 2019 Ethiopian film subtitled in English about the lives of domestic workers from East Africa who relocate to Arabic-speaking countries under harsh conditions. I don’t want to ruin it for you. Please watch it for yourself. Here’s my take-away.
Ethiopian cinema is defined by its ability to weave together intricate strands. First, we must unpack how we see cinematic characters. We must unbraid or undo any preconceived notions that detract from the chosen storyline. The preset design for standard films leaves less filmmaking guesswork, but it also limits our ability to create a new diegetic world with distinct features. Ethiopian films in color tend to look flat (without depth of field) because of the camera lens, lighting and editing techniques in use to capture an image. There is general mastery in manipulating equipment but less individuality and risk-taking. Although not German Expressionism with its stark contrast or Italian neo-realism defining characters in economic terms, Ethiopian cinema is a phenomenon not to be ignored. To begin watching an Ethiopian film, we can put the past behind us and make space for a new frame of mind. Ethiopian cinema involves both synthetic and natural elements of an environment both sacred and profane. One prop that seemed out-of-place in Sewnetwa is the obsolete cigarette. Do people even smoke anymore? Now that the harm of tobacco has been established, it’s less likely people would smoke, but that’s just my opinion.
Ethiopian cinema is related to hair-braiding, because braids are a sign of beauty with complex patterns and there's an often simple, repetitive process in the way each story is produced. Sewnetwa reveals how lives are interwoven in compelling ways with dignity and honor, shame and discrimination. Braids can take an hour or two or more to complete, which is the length of a feature-length fiction film. Sometimes more than one person works on a person’s scalp at the same time, but not many. It is similar to cinema, a collaborative art that in developing countries requires one person to play many roles from writer to director.
Women are at the center of cinema, but it’s a man’s gaze we compete for. The hope with shuruba cinema is to create films that stay with us in our hearts and minds for ages to come with enduring beauty and charm.
- Yerusalem Work
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