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Faat Kin
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Wikipedia article
'Faat Kin' is a 2000 Senegalese film written and directed by Ousmane Sembne, set in present-day Dakar, Senegal. It provides a critical look at modern, post-colonial Senegal and the place of women in that society. It gives a clear glimpse into life of the Senegalaise middle-class and presents present-day Dakar in all of its contradictions of poverty and wealth, tradition and modernity.
Plot
After two pregnancies out of wedlock, Faat Kin has earned a place for herself as a successful gas station owner in patriarchal Senegalaise society, raising her two children alone and providing fully for their needs.
After passing their baccalaureates, Faat Kin's children, Djip and Aby, try to fix their mother up with Uncle Jean, a Christian businessman, who outwardly objects because Kin is Muslim, but is actually pursuing her.
Throughout the film, Kin reminisces about her life. She was very close to getting her own baccalaurat when she was impregnated by one of her professors. She was subsequently expelled and disowned by her father. Angered at the shame Kine brought on their family, he even attempted to burn her but her mother shielded her; surviving with severe burn scars on her back. Kin later started working at a gas station as an attendant to support herself. Only a few years after her first pregnancy, she became pregnant again and was abandoned by her fiance who took her life savings and tried to flee the country. Since then, Faat Kin has been successful; buying a house for herself, her two children, and her mother. Back in the present, Kin is very happy when her children present her their baccalaurat diplomas.
At the party to celebrate the graduates, Djip's father shows up, but Djip consistently refers to him as "Monsieur Boubacar Omar Payane, a.k.a. BOP" rather than "father." Aby's father, M. Gaye, also comes to the party, and she asks him to finance her college education. Her father is offended and tells her to ask Kin, despite the fact that it is Kin who has raised Aby her whole life, while Gaye has given her no support. After an altercation involving BOP, Gaye, and Djip, the two men are booted out of the party. At the end of the party, Djib and Aby are delighted to discover that Faat Kin and Uncle Jean have become a couple, which they attribute to their matchmaking skills, but it is clear that Faat Kin and Uncle Jean were attracted to each other from the beginning.
See also
* Cinema of Senegal
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