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TUMAINI (CHILDHOOD ROBBED)
Tanzania, 2005, 100 minutes, Colour.
Directed by Beartrix Mugishagwe.
One of the first Tanzanian features. It is clearly designed for the wide Tanzanian audience and draws on the styles of the telenovella. The makers know their audience well and tumaini received an enthusiastic response at its Zanzibar Film Festival screening. The film is a Tanzanian look at Tanzanian problems.
Tumaini is a fifteen year old girl whose father dies from AIDS and whose mother is infected. After her death, she and her brother and sister, despised by their cousins as ‘AIDS orphans’ are exploited by their uncle and aunt, although they have the love and care of their grandmother. Already the film deals with the key issue of HIV infection and the willingness and unwillingness to face this epidemic in Africa. The film then takes on quite a number of further problems, the orphans to AIDS, runaway children and the towns’ street kids, prostitution and pimps before it returns sadly to its HIV theme.
The film is emotional, of course, relying on its popularly drawn characters in identifiable situations to make its points. It seems about to end quite a few times in the latter part of the film but chooses to conclude on a happy ending, blended with romance and realism (and the African discussion of the use of condoms in the epidemic context) – but it still reminds its audience of reality as it glimpses the ghosts of those who have died and the camera tracks again past their headstones.
1. The Tanzanian film industry at this stage? A first feature film? Geared towards the local audience? The television novel and soap style? Both for entertainment and education?
2. The popular style: the narrative, the characters, situations, emotions, sentiment, message?
3. AIDS in Africa, in Tanzania, the number of deaths, the children orphaned, the children dying? The reticence about admitting AIDS? The film as a means for audiences learning about AIDS?
4. The opening funeral, the body, transported, the father of the family, Tumaini and her getting the body, the memories? The burial, the family present? The scourge of AIDS?
5. Tumaini’s mother, her fragility, illness, the revelation that she had been infected? Her dependence on Thomas? The past relationship, her explanation of her love for her husband? The issue of the cheque, her being grateful to Thomas, his helping the children? Her not knowing that he had taken the money? Her love for her children, the detail of work, at home, sowing the vegetables, the old man? Her death, her burial? The consequences for the children?
6. Tumaini, her age, oldest child, her care for the others, going to school, her relationship with her twelve-year-old brother, the younger sister and her illness? Missing her father? Her intelligence, her shrewdness about the cheque, knowing the truth about Thomas? The deaths and the impact? Living with the cousins, the cousins taunting them as AIDS orphans? The brother’s fight, her stopping it, defence of him? Thomas and his wife and their treatment? The love for her grandmother, the aunts? Staying, the uniform for the little girl, the boy and the hard work? Her discussions with the principal?
7. Thomas, his love for his sister-in-law, his attitude towards his wife? Wanting to help, a weak character? His relationship with his mother, deceiving her? The cheque, wanting a new boat, wanting a loan, the arguments at the bank, the refusal? His wife and her leading him on, the sinister use of the money, the rationalisations? The failed loan, drinking, sex with the woman in the bar, the irony of his being infected? The confrontation, the boy leaving, his going to the city, finding him, saving him? Rescuing Tumaini? His illness, the blood test, with his wife, their preparing for death, the deaths?
8. The old man, his kindness, the vegetable seeds, the other gifts, his courting the grandmother, the meals, his wise sayings, his tending the graves at the end?
9. Tumaini as a character, coping, her age, the boy and his running away, her going to the city, wandering the streets, hungry, encountering the gang, her brother and his character, wandering the streets, the robbery, being left with the fruit, his uncle saving him? The anger of a twelve-year-old boy?
10. Tumaini, her wisdom, the principal, the bank, the search? The pathos of her being robbed? Her being picked up, the threats of the pimp, her being saved? The boy from the gang, the attraction?
11. The boy, street kid, his helping the boy, his talk with Tumaini, with the uncle, giving information, saving her? Returning to the village, working on the boat, hard work? His returning to his family? His return to Tumaini?
12. The new family after the deaths, the man with the boat and his kindness, success in fishing?
13. The boy and his return, his love for Tumaini, the future – and her little lecture about love, study, condoms?
14. The visuals of the ending – love and hope? But the continued reminder of the gravestones and the ghosts of those who had died?