May 7, 06:09 PM
Amakula Kampala
On the bus ride from Nairobi to Arusha back in mid-March, right at the first leg of our trip, we bought a Kenyan newspaper. As we flipped through it, one of us noticed that there would be an international film festival in Kampala, Uganda, at roughly the same time in May that we were already planning on traveling there. What luck! We were so excited. So, it’s been since then that we’ve been planning on attending at least part of the festivities provided in the 3rd Annual Amakula Kampala International Film Festival.
As huge movie buffs, we couldn’t have been more excited to arrive in time on Thursday evening, May 4th, to see the beginning of the opening ceremonies for the film festival, which included a local marching band leading the guests into Uganda’s National Theatre in downtown Kampala. The opening night film, about an American gospel band “Sweet Honey in the Rock,” was an odd choice, we thought, but we were soothed by a huge spread of free food offered to all attendees (quite a nice add-on, since the entire festival itself is free).
The American Embassy is one the many sponsors of the event, and we considered our tax money well spent.
A little worse for wear, Uganda’s National Theatre, while comfortable, is sadly still not as nice or large as the auditorium in the average American high school. Also, we use the word “film” broadly, because there’s not actually a film projector but a DVD video projector donated by the Japanese development agency.
However, despite the occasional power outage, cancellation of films promised to be presented, and some bad sound quality on one or two films, it has been a really great change of pace for us and we’re enjoying attending part of the ten-day festival.
We’ve seen several interesting African films, enjoyed commentary by the local film festival organizers, and have also seen many performances by local musicians, artists, and acrobats. One of the most memorable moments was the the 70th birthday celebration of one of Uganda’s leading composers, Wassanyi Serukenya, at the festival last night. We even got cake.