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Sankofa

  • FilmScene at The Chauncey 404 East College Street Iowa City, IA, 52240 United States (map)

Presented in partnership with Sankofa Outreach Connection and Beloved Community Initiative with a post-screening discussion.

A Community Collaborations event presented by GreenState Credit Union

"A visually enrapturing movie...the legacy, beauty, and humanist sensibilities contained within Sankofa still call to us today."—Robert Daniels, RogerEbert.com

"Gerima is doing nothing less than reconstituting and affirming the full humanity of the enslaved."—Richard Brody, The New Yorker

The new 4K restoration from Ava DuVernay's Array Releasing is presented as part of the 28 Days of Sankofa national screening series in which the film will be playing every day in the month of February across the country along with a post-screening experience that engages in the larger themes of community and personal history the film.

Sankofa follows Mona (Oyafunmike Ogunlano), a Black American fashion model on a photo shoot in Cape Coast, Ghana. Through director Haile Gerima's imaginative storytelling, she undergoes a journey back in time to a plantation in North America. There she becomes Shola, an enslaved African woman who labors in the master’s house and experiences the horrors of slavery firsthand. In becoming Shola, Mona recovers and confronts her ancestral identity and experience. While enduring monstrous trauma at the hands of white men who owned people for profit, Shola’s interactions with her fellow enslaved Africans are rich with humanity, respect and dignity for one another. Most notably, she connects with Shango (Mutabaruka), a rebellious African man who toils in the fields, and Nunu (Alexandra Duah), one of the few of the enslaved to remember her life in Africa before being stolen and terrorized by European traders.

This event is FREE and open to the public. Seats are first come first served. Doors will open approximately 30 minutes before showtime.

Earlier Event: February 16
Book Group
Later Event: March 5
Worship