Abdulkadir Ahmed Said: On the Front Line of African Cinema

Abdulkadir Ahmed Said calls himself a “guerrilla filmmaker.” Originally from Somalia, Said has lived in numerous African countries and recently spent a semester teaching guerrilla filmmaking at the Cave Hill campus of the University of the West Indies in Barbados. Jane Bryce discusses with him what he expected, what brought him there, and what he hoped to achieve. The story begins in Mogadishu in the 1950s and encompasses education in the Soviet Union and Italy, the Somali revolution, the founding of the African cinema movement, and exile in Egypt and South Africa. Through it all runs an abiding commitment to the principles of pan-Africanism and a fierce belief in what the continent can achieve for itself without outside help. Deploying these weapons, Said launched a guerrilla attack in Barbados against fear of the Day of Judgment and the blandishments of Hollywood.