Fighting for the homeland? The Second World War in the films of Ousmane Sembene

Citation

Murphy D (2007) Fighting for the homeland? The Second World War in the films of Ousmane Sembene. Esprit Createur, 47 (1), pp. 56-67. https://doi.org/10.1353/esp.2007.0025

Abstract
First paragraph: Towards the end of Ousmane Sembene's film Emitaï (1971), set in the Casamance region of southern Senegal during the Second World War, a messenger arrives in a village occupied by the French colonial army, which is there to requisition rice for its men. The messenger brings news of a change in regime in the metropolitan 'center' of the French Empire, resulting in the hasty removal of posters of Marshall Pétain, one of which had stood framed behind the French commander when he had earlier sent the young African conscripts off to war, and their replacement by posters of General Charles de Gaulle (see opposite). The colonial troops, thetirailleurs sénégalais, who had led the conscripts away to the strains of Maréchal, nous voilà, are extremely confused at this sudden change of authority, and an indignant, disbelievingtirailleur (played by none other than Sembene himself) asks his African NCO to explain how a mere "Général de brigade" could possibly replace a "Maréchal": "Où tu as vu deux étoiles commander sept étoiles?" Sembene thus presents the change in regime from Vichy to Free France as entirely cosmetic, the replacement of one remote image or figurehead by another. It is no coincide that this change in regime occurs just minutes before the film's final sequence, in which the men of the village are gunned down by the colonial troops for refusing to hand over the rice. In essence, the spectator is invited to perceive a fundamental continuity between the colonial policies of Vichy and Free France.

Keywords
Films; War; WORLD

Journal
Esprit Createur: Volume 47, Issue 1