Black Mother

A well-known photographer of street culture, Khalik Allah immerses himself in the voices and faces of Jamaica. Be it the daily life of Kingston’s prostitutes or the country’s relationship with colonial history and revivalist cults, this polyphonic rhapsody disconnects image and sound, which both enrich each other without the singularity of souls ever hardening into a sociological catalogue. At one moment, people hold up to the camera books as important as Chancellor Williams’ The Destruction of Black Civilization, but this fleeting theoretical hiatus is immediately swept away in a flow of litanies, songs, prayers or a list of the fruit and vegetables that abound in Jamaica. Fragments of life and history are often mingled with the desire of the inhabitants he meets to give a characteristic image of their island (“a blessed place, with water, springs!”) and its historical and physical resilience (the “strength” of the black mother). The mounting frenzy of the editing falls into step with a people whose spiritual aspirations are constantly changing. Incidentally, the film could not offer a more timely response to the recent xenophobic remark of President Trump, who described the African and Caribbean states as “shithole countries”. (Charlotte Garson)