Les Sénégalaises et la Sénégauloise (Alice Diop, 2007)

Director Alice Diop was born in France to Senegalese parents. Spending a month in Senegal, armed with a small camera, she films everyday life. She paints the portrait of three women of her family: Néné and her two daughters Mouille and Mame Sarr. “ This film is the portrait of a courtyard and the women who live there, three urban Senegalese. A mother and her two daughters. This courtyard is a bit like the metaphor of the gynoeceum in Senegal: a partitioned space, exclusively female, where faced with the adversity of everyday life, some struggle, try to fight while others wait, “bask“ and dream of leaving. Here, there are no men but many children, comings and goings, a vast chaos managed by these women who, alone, make sure that everything holds. This yard is my mother’s yard, that of her childhood...“