The History of Rwandan Cinema 1

Like other countries in the region, the history of cinema in Rwanda begins with the colonial period. Initially, Rwanda was a colony of German East Africa (Deutsch-Ostarfrika). At that time, a company called "Deutsche Kolonial Gesellschaft (DKG)," or "German Colonial Society," was responsible for making films in the German colonies with technical support, and the French company Pathé Frères was one of the market specialists.

On December 28, 1895, and 1898, only three years after the birth of cinema, the German government expressed its desire to make films in its colonies. In that year, Dr. Stuhlmann, who was the head of the Amani Institute in East Africa, asked for financial assistance to make a film in the German colonies. At the same time, the German photographer Carl Müller made various films about German East Africa and was able to show these films for the first time on April 10, 1905.

The films showed some of the colonial activities, such as the construction of administrative buildings during colonialism, the cultivation of new crops such as coffee, scenes of colonial coastal settlements, the training of native soldiers (called "askaris") from East Africa, traditional African dances, and more.

Until Germany lost the First World War in 1918 and was expelled from its colonies, it had managed to make between fifty and sixty films, including the one made in Tanganyika, since it had its headquarters in Bagamoyo (between 1885 and 1890) and Dar Es Salaam (between 1890 and 1918).

Since the first world war started in 1914, one would think that the Germans had no time to establish a stable cinema programme in the Rwanda-Urundi region. The cinema did not have time to take root at that time. Rwanda was admitted to the League of Nations, SDN (Société Des Nations) in June 1919, and Burundi was annexed to the Belgian Congo on July 20, 1922.

What attracted the Belgians at the beginning was not taking care of their new territory (called "Karindwi"), but the overthrow of King Musinga, with which they did not agree at all. We can say that they began to rule Rwanda in the 1930s, and what interested them about Rwanda-Urundi was finding the energy (workers) to use in the mines in the Congo.

In the film that the Belgian Gérard De Boe made in 1958 and called En Cinquante Ans, he often returns to the images of Rwandans and Burundians being taken to the Congo to work in the local mines. Whoever said that cinema was not part of their plan in Rwanda at that time would not be wrong, since the SDN had given Belgium a B-type mandate where it ordered Belgium to manage Rwanda-Urundi without religious interference or military establishments (Reyntjens, 1985, 43).

In 1949, Gérard de Boé, who had been a health worker in the Democratic Republic of the Congo since 1927 and who also made real films (non-professionally), made a real film, Rwanda-Urundi. Six years later, the film Mr. Kitoko, made by André Cauvin in 1955, tells about the journey of King Baudouin of Belgium to the Belgian Congo and Rwanda-Urundi in May and June 1955, where he arrived in Rwanda from Gitega in Burundi on the dates before June 1955.

In 1956, Luc de Heusch, a real film director and researcher on culture and people's traditions, made a true film about Rwanda called «Rwanda tableaux d'une féodalité pastorale».

These writers and cultural researchers are the ones who made Hollywood know about Rwanda, and they made the first feature film there. Based on the historical story "King Solomon's Mines," written by the Englishman Henry Rider Haggard in 1885, members of the major Hollywood company Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer made the historical film "King Solomon's Mines" (1950, 103 min.), directed by Compton Bennett and Andrew Marton.

The film was released on November 24, 1950, and cost two million, two hundred and fifty-eight US dollars ($2,258,000), which is slightly more than one and a half billion Rwandan francs. Cinema in Rwanda during the First and Second Republics: 1962–1994: After Rwanda gained independence on July 1, 1962, cinema was never really part of the government's plans since it was not part of the colonial government's plan.

There is no such thing as a cinema programme; it does not exist. It asked to start it, but it didn't. It was just about the media in 1961. The lack of motion picture culture at the beginning is also reflected in the delay in the establishment of national television, which was conceived as a project in November 1986, eight months before Rwanda celebrated its 25th anniversary of independence.

Only in writing was the project started for four years because Rwanda Television started showing its first video on December 31, 1990, working three days a week (Wednesday, Saturday, and Sunday). Although no Rwandans dared to make films for more than 20 years after Rwanda's independence, films that were shown in Rwanda were shown mainly in high schools and on the news, and there were even private houses that showed films from abroad.

For example, the most famous one in the city of Kigali, which is known as "Mayaka's House," is said to have been built in the mid-1970s. It is now known as "Cine Elmay." In terms of making and directing movies, the Rwandan Gaspard Habiyambere was the one who became an uncle when he directed the short film Manirafasha in 1986 (Gakunzi, R., 2012).

He is considered to be the first Rwandan who managed to direct a film, as his film managed to be recognized at the international level. However, the person who came to play an important role in Rwandan cinema during the Second Republic was Mr. Kalisa Callixte, who was known in the "Indamutsa" theater as a coach of actors. Kalisa Callixte was part of the team that produced the actual film "Rwanda: A Developing Country" (1987, 56 min), produced by the National Press Agency (ORINFOR) in collaboration with CINE-MUNDO.

This film was made to show what had been achieved in the country during the 25 years that Rwanda had been independent. In particular, in that year 1987, Kalisa Callixte, supported by the Canadians, directed a real movie called "Rwanda, Les Collines de l'effort" (58 min), especially its images, which were taken differently. The video used 16mm of footage.

A year later, the film Gorillas in the Mist (1988) was made in Rwanda about the killing of "Nyiramacibiri" (Diana Fossey), and we put it in the category of "Rwanda films," directed by foreigners but talking about Rwanda, which was made by Americans. Although there was no filmmaking culture in general, unfortunately, one of those who started to give hope to Rwandan cinema, Mr. Kalisa Callixte, was killed and shot on April 6, 1994, when the Genocide against the Tutsi began. and the cinema, the life of the country at all levels had entered the darkness.

#Rwanda #Rwandancinema #belgium #germany #CarlMüller #LucdeHeusch #AfricanCinema #PathéFrères #colonialera #kalisacallixte #Tutsi #RwandanGenocide