1 At the Paris conference of the International Federation of Film Archives (Fiaf) on African Film Archives in April 2008 someone said that in a few years some of the African moving images holdings in Africa would be probably available on the net.

2 The problem is that there is discussion about who is an African … Is the third generation of an immigrant family from Africa in Europe still an African?…when he makes films is that an African film and if he is not considered as African but the film tackles issues which are considered by Africans as African, what does this mean then?

3 But there is also a significant rejection in the west of images made by Africans on Africa.

4 In 1975 Samora Machel founded the Mozambican Film Institute which had also an archival role, and in 1992 the National Film, Video and Sound Archive was founded in Jos Nigeria (Nwanneka Okonkwo, “Preserving the Harvest of our Creative Spirit: The Nigerian Experience”, Journal of Film Preservation 76 (2008) pp. 13-17).

5 It is only in recent decades that there is has been any interest in the heritage of these African photographs.

6 Since the end of the 20th century there has been renewed interest in looking to the colonial history in Europe.

7 Cf. the numerous films made by Europeans and Africans in Africa such as the French fiction film Coup de Tourchon by Bertrand Tavernier (1981). This feature filmed in Senegal is a reflection on some excesses during colonial times.

8 In the US this was also the case. There was a subculture from the nineteen twenties of Afro-Americans making films for Africans. They were not meant for white Americans and they were an answer to the main stream colonial (racist) culture in the country. In the 1970s and 1980s the Afro-Americans became an important economical factor in mainstream cinema so non-Afro-Americans started to produce films with Afro-Americans for this public (blaxploitation).

9 Guido Convents, Images & Democratie Les Congolais face au cinema et à l'audiovisual. line histoire politio-culturelle du Congo des Beiges jusqu'à la République démocratique du Congo (1896-2006), (Berchem, 2006), p.95.

10 James Patterson, “Africa on Film”, African Research & Documentation, 68, ‘Images of Africa’ (1995), pp.75-79. In his article Patterson looks to film by non Africans for non Africans in British collections. He gives some attention to the films produced in Africa for Africans by non Africans from the colonial film units and indicates that some of these productions can be found in the UK. He mentions that there are also African films, which has to be understood as films made by Africans, but that is not the main theme of the article.

11 Smyth, Rosaleen, ‘The British Colonial Film Unit and Sub-Saharan Africa’, Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television, 8 (1988), pp.285-298.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

12 Some people say that after independence African filmmakers started to make film in “their way”. Often they had no choice to go “their way” because they did not have the same budgets or even training and schooling as those who made Hollywood or big European productions. These foreign mass products are taken as standards by African publics, but this does not mean that they are not receptive to their own stories produced with almost no money and in poor quality..

13 Some hardliners (mostly English speaking Africans) consider these films as African films made for a non-African public and they don't consider them ‘African’. But most French speaking Africans don't see it that way. Sembene Ousmane (1923-2007) and Djibril Diop Mambety (1945-1998) from Senegal, made almost all their films with non-African co producers and they are considered as outstanding examples of African filmmakers. When Djibril Diop Mabety made Hyènes (1992), based on the Swiss novel The visit of the old lady by Friedrich Dürrenmatt, he disturbed a number of Africans because they could not accept that an African filmmaker would look for inspiration into European literature. Jeannick Le Naour, «La Cinémathèque Afrique. La Cinémathèque Afrique conserve l'une des collections les plus complètes de films africains », Journal ofFilmpreservation 76 (2008), pp.36-37 (with English Summary). About 1400 titles are preserved. The films are present because they received financial assistance from the French government in the context of the French international (cultural) policy towards Africa.

14 One of the classics of African cinema, the Senegalese feature film Touki Bouki (1973) by Djibril Diop Mabety, was only restored through the intervention of an private American film fund, the World Cinema Foundation, presided over by the American actor Martin Scorcese.

15 Newton Adouaka won with Ezra the Golden Yennega for the best African film at the most prestigious African film festival (Fespaco) in Ouagadougou in 2007.

16 Even in 2006 it was very difficult to launch a project in Belgium to save Congolese short films made between 1972 and 2004 and get them finally available in Congo and abroad. Finally the French speaking community in Belgium made a collection of 21 short films from Congolese available for the French speaking world with the double DVD Yambi, RDCiné Congo. “Such collections about milestones in African cinema are necessary and give an impulse to preserve them. What is unknown will not be preserved. This is the task of the Fiaf, historians but also the Film festivals who are specialised in African cinema.” said the president at the African Film Festival of Leuven in 2006.

17 An example: In 2008 the Portuguese Film archives with Portuguese funds is assisting the Mozambicans to save their film archives in rebuilding the Mozambican Film Institute which partially burned out in February 1991. José Manuel Costa, “Mission in Maputo: Saving the film Collection at Inac”, Journal of Film Preservation, 76 (2008), pp.25-28.

18 In preparing this Pan African film Archive, the Belgian Professor Victor Bachy with his contacts at Unesco started a project in 1986 of making an inventory of all African films in the main Belgian private and public archives. It was an enormous project and the finances were assured (almost Elm). The concept was to find the best copy (negative and positive) of an ‘African film’ (though made in the colonial years), to restore it if necessary and then to make three 35mm or 16mm copies : one for the Belgian archive, one for a new Zairian archive and the third for the foreseen Pan African film archives in Ouagadougou. An inventory was made with more than thousand titles. But due to the incapacity of the Belgian Royal Film Archives at that time the project could not be executed. Up to then this archive - like other traditional film archives - focused upon films which were considered important in understanding ‘traditional’ western film history. Guido Convents, Jean Buchet. Cinématographie coloniale beige. Inventaire des archives cinématographiques conserveés en Belgique (Louvain-la-Neuve, Ed. Cesca, 1991,130 pp.).

In 2008 Dr. Samuel Tilman started with his company Eklektik Productions a similar project in collaboration with the most important Belgian archives with film holdings (and with the Belgian Royal Film Archives) from the colonial era. www.filmcolonial.eu The project is called « Projet de sauvegarde et de rapatriement». It is running and will be accomplished in 2010.

19 Ardiouma Soma, “La Cinémathèque africaine de Ouagadougou-Burkina . Faso”, Journal of Film Preservation, 77/78 (2008), pp.38-41 (with English summary).

20 For more information about Guy Bomanyama Zandu see www.zandufilms.be