Camp de Thiaroye

Sensitively probing the legacy of a colonial postwar tragedy in Senegal, the legendary Ousmane Sembène partnered with Thierno Faty Sow to craft this rich, enraging work of cinema as historical corrective. Camp de Thiaroye chronicles the lead-up to the Thiaroye Massacre, a horrific event in which the French military murdered hundreds of West African soldiers, freshly returned from serving in the European theater of WWII, for their righteous insistence upon receiving their promised (and unpaid) wages and benefits. Winner of the Grand Jury Prize at the 1988 Venice Film Festival, Camp de Thiaroye was banned in France for more than a decade; it endures as one of cinema’s most powerful and precise portraits of both war and colonial racism. An NYFF62 Revivals selection.

Restored by The Film Foundation’s World Cinema Project and Cineteca di Bologna at L’Immagine Ritrovata laboratory in association with the Tunisian Ministry of Culture and the Senegalese Ministry of Culture and Historical Heritage. Special thanks to Mohammed Challouf. Restoration funded by the Hobson/Lucas Family Foundation. This restoration is part of the African Film Heritage Project, an initiative created by The Film Foundation’s World Cinema Project, the Pan African Federation of Filmmakers and UNESCO—in collaboration with Cineteca di Bologna—to help locate, restore, and disseminate African cinema.