Educational Media Reviews Online

This film is visually beautiful with a never-ending sense of the power and presence of the land in which it is set. It is a parable about the origins and tragedies of fratricide, which can be seen as a direct commentary on the many wars and conflicts erupting in Africa and around the world today.

It is a retelling of the Biblical story of Jacob and his sons, their battles amongst each other, and with the other tribes in the vicinity. The familiar narrative of resentment, exile, revenge and loss is relocated to the arid lands of West Africa which makes the ferocity of the battles for land and water not just believable but inevitable. The repetition of violence between brothers and against others is a powerful and disturbing motif.

The film focuses on three clans: Jacob's tribe of nomadic shepherds, riding horses and living in tents; Hamor's Canaanite tribe of farmers, who cultivate the land and live in permanent stone dwellings; and Esau, Jacob's estranged, embittered brother, who is the chief of a group of hunter/gatherers. The film opens with Esau proclaiming his bitterness towards God and his desire for vengeance against Jacob. Jacob is in deep mourning for his favorite son Joseph, who has apparently been torn apart by wild beasts, despite the presence of his 12 brothers. In fact, the 12 brothers were so jealous of Joseph that they sold him to some slave traders. The brothers' attempts to be innocent and mournful are one of the few amusing aspects of the film.

These three groups watch each other and occasionally clash. The situation reaches a head when Sichem, Hamor's son abducts and rapes Jacob's daughter Dinah. Repentant, he seeks to marry her and thus unite the two groups. He agrees to the marriage on the condition that all the farmers are circumcised. After the mass circumcision has occurred, while the men are recovering, Jacob's men attack the farmers, slaying their men and destroying their homes. This genocide leads to a council of nations where much shouting, posturing and storytelling is done. The storytelling recalls the story of Isaac and Rebekah, which happened 'in the time before the rift between father and son, man and God,' and the original estrangement between Jacob and Esau when Jacob forced Esau to give up his birthright for a bowl of soup. Included is the story of Judah, a son of Jacob and Tamar, the Canaanite widow of his son who had to pose as a prostitute to be impregnated by her father-in-law. This story is meant to prove the impossibility of maintaining separate bloodlines, an ideal situation proposed by Jacob's sons. In their view it will solve the problem. Eventually, Jacob wrestles with God, and Esau forgives him and tells everyone to go to Egypt where Joseph will take care of them.

For those with a shaky grasp of the Bible story, the film won't make much sense. The elliptical nature of the original narrative combined with the traditional African story telling make the details of the plot very difficult to follow. Furthermore, many of the subtitles are illegible, as they are yellow, often against a white or beige background. Nevertheless, this is a powerful compelling film. The movements of the tribes against the land, the depictions of different modes of life, and the daily round of tasks and divisions is both beautifully filmed and fascinating to watch.

This college level production would be a good addition to those libraries that collect African films and an interesting addition to religious and anthropological collections.