60
Dramatically naive at times, but still represents a refreshingly ambitious, imaginative film in a period of creative underachievement for African cinema.
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What are critics saying?
80
The New York Times by A.O. Scott
The narrative motion is tricky; first it canters, then shifts into a heady, quick gallop. What's most fascinating about Adanggaman are the scenes that feel like anecdotal rest stops but that are actually building into a nuanced and engrossing whole.
75
New York Daily News by Jami Bernard
This one uses sweeping compositions of nearly solitary figures as a reminder of what individuals stood to lose, and an auction scene is horrifying -- some livestock and a basket of everyday items are exchanged for a man's future.
63
Chicago Tribune by John Petrakis
The film doesn't always take advantage of its dramatic potential (except for its strong soundtrack), as it relies too heavily on scenes of crazed warriors in makeup and costume, running and screaming and jumping up and down.
70
Beautifully filmed, but extremely painful examination of the African slave trade takes a difficult position: Rather than focusing on the white European superstructure, Ivory Coast director Roger Gnoan M'bala focuses on African complicity in the capture and selling of African people.
63
Well-acted and nicely photographed, and has good action sequences, even if the screenplay (by M'Bala, Jean-Marie Adiaffi and Bertin Akaffou) is simplistic and there are slow stretches.
70
Village Voice by Michael Atkinson
Ostensibly factual, helplessly self-conscious -- Adanggaman is being touted as the continent's first film about slavery as it was experienced on African soil—where the victims and enslavers were both native peoples.