The screening dates for two Rwandan films, ‘Settling’ and ‘The Young Cyclist’, on Al Jazeera English have been announced. The two films by Rwandan filmmakers Amelia Umuhire and Yuhi Amuli respectively, are among 14 short films from 11 African countries selected for the first tranche of Al Jazeera English’s Africa Direct, a distinctive series of compelling and immersive short documentaries produced and directed by all-African filmmaking talent. These character-led films, which are African stories, told by African filmmakers about African lives, are traditional and modern, poignant and flamboyant, with people who are surviving or thriving, poor or powerful. According to Al Jazeera English’s official screening schedule, ‘The Young Cyclist’ (Rwanda) by filmmaker Yuhi Amuli has been lined up screening as episode 3 on December 14, alongside Desert Libraries, a film by Malian Beïrey-Hou and Cameroonian movie ‘Happiness’. Yuhi’s film is about one Aliane Mugisha who tells her story with soft-spoken candour. Once a roadside hawker in Rwanda’s capital Kigali, she was intrigued by the local bicycle taxi riders and decided she wanted a new business. Meanwhile Umuhire’s documentary ‘Settling’ was shortlisted on the same Episode 4 screening line-up slated for December 21 alongside Congolese movies ‘Diggers’ and ‘Merchants’. In ‘Settling’, for instance, one character identified as Josephine takes viewers on a journey through the city, including Kigali’s oldest urban settlement, as she explains her ideas of humanising urban design. Woven through this is her own story of moving countries, challenging gender roles and finding life affirmation after personal tragedy. Viewership The films so far aired via Al Jazeera English are receiving overwhelmingly positive responses from audiences. In one week the first two short documentaries, ‘On the White Nile’ by South Sudanese filmmaker Akuol de Mabior, and ‘The Bookmaker’, a film by Ethiopian filmmaker Girum Berehanetsehay have enjoyed almost 135, 000 views. “We’ve received overwhelmingly warm and positive responses from our global viewers to these short documentaries, which tell authentic African stories, made by great African filmmaking talent,” says Ingrid Falck, the head of documentaries at Al Jazeera English, who conceived and commissioned the series. “It’s very gratifying to see feedback that appreciates these multi-dimensional insights into a range of African experiences, which go beyond the usual coverage of the continent. Not only are these responses useful for us but they help the filmmakers see how compelling their stories are to other Africans – and of course to the rest of the world,” he adds. Al Jazeera has huge audiences across Africa and shows a lot of great Africa-centered content—but the western gaze still casts a long shadow over Africa in a lot of other international media. As a result, the news agency has long championed the idea that those who know their stories best should own them in the media, claim their storytelling space, and Africa Direct is one of the initiatives launched by the agency to achieve the milestone.
