Discover the rarely screened but groundbreaking works of the late Safi Faye and her keen ethnographic lens, on her journey from actress, to first Sub-Saharan African woman to direct a commercially distributed film, to being lauded at Cannes.
Director in Focus: Safi Faye
Selling Fast
Come and Work
The first ever African film to screen at Cannes, this detailed investigation of village life is a profound meditation on time, memory and community.
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I, Your Mother
“When will you return?” This haunting question – familiar to many an expat – is asked of a Senegalese student in West Berlin.
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Selling Fast
Letter From My Village
This trailblazing work – the first feature made by a woman from Sub-Saharan Africa – sets a story of love and land against a postcolonial backdrop.
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Selling Fast
Little by Little
In her first foray into cinema, Safi Faye acts in Jean Rouch’s comedy about two Nigeriens whose Paris trip becomes a lesson in ‘reverse ethnography’.
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Standby
Mossane
In a rare work of pure fiction for Safi Faye, drawing from a Wolof legend, a teen brings disaster to her village after defying an arranged marriage.
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Short
Selbé: One Among Many
Safi Faye’s groundbreaking 1983 ethnographic documentary uses one Senegalese woman’s experience to comment widely on gender and society.
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