In March, the French Institute and Cinema Orion invite audiences on a journey into the film production of French-speaking Africa. The program features six films from different countries and eras. The film series brings to the big screen both personal and political stories, stunning aesthetics, and a wide range of themes and perspectives that testify to the vitality of African cinema. The films are subtitled in English.
2.3.2026 KLO 19:40 ELÄMÄ ON KAUNIS (LA VIE EST BELLE, 1987)
A young man named Korou (Papa Wemba) leaves his home village to pursue a career as a music star in Kinshasa, Congo. Amid a series of misadventures, Kourou ends up working as a house servant, a shoe shiner, a street singer, and even the right-hand man of a nightclub boss. When Kourou meets the beautiful Kabibi, sparks of love ignite—but he is not the only one who has fallen under her spell…
8.3.2026 KLO 14:00 VIIKUNOIDEN ALLA (SOUS LES FIGUES, 2022)
Among the fig trees in the height of the summer harvest season, young adults develop feelings for one another, go on dates, try to understand each other, form deeper relationships—and sometimes run away from them.
9.3.2026 KLO 19:45 KANSALLISUUTENA MAAHANMUUTTAJA (NATIONALITÉ IMMIGRÉ, 1975)
Mauritanian laborer Sidi works in France. Like most migrant workers, he is hired for the toughest and most dangerous jobs. Sidi and his comrades face constant and systematic exploitation—not only from their employers, but also from their own countrymen, who provide forged work permits and dilapidated housing for which migrants pay exorbitant prices just to have a roof over their heads. Yet amid racism and economic exploitation, the migrant workers decide to come together, negotiate, and organize.
16.3.2026 KLO 19:40 TIMBUKTU (2013)
In Mali, near Timbuktu, which has fallen under the control of religious extremists, Kidane lives a simple and peaceful life among the dunes with his wife Satima, his daughter Toya, and his 12-year-old shepherd Issan. In the city, residents live powerless under the terror of the jihadists, who now dictate how everyone must believe. Music and laughter, smoking, and even football are forbidden. Women have become shadows who try to resist with dignity. Makeshift courts hand down absurd and tragic sentences every day.
Kidane’s family has been spared the chaos reigning in the city, but their fate changes when Kidane accidentally kills the fisherman Amadou, who slaughtered his favorite cow. Now Kidane, too, must face the laws of the occupying regime.
16.3.2026 KLO 19:40 TUG OF WAR (2021)
Tug of War Tug of War is an adaptation of the novel by award-winning Swahili writer Adam Shafin set in 1950s Zanzibar. It is a love story swept up in the turbulent final years of British colonial rule and the rise of the local liberation movement. Young freedom fighter Denge meets Yasmine, a young Indian-Zanzibari woman fleeing a stifling arranged marriage. Passion and revolution collide.
30.3.2026 KLO 19:40 TUULEN JÄLJET (LES EMPREINTES DU VENT, 2024)
Recently completed and deeply anchored in the present day the film Traces of the Wind offers an intimate reflection on memory, displacement, and the transmission of heritage. Through minimalist direction and poetic storytelling, Layla Triqui invites viewers to listen to the silences and traces left behind by history and human movement.
