An African night at the movies

Michael Booth joined the eager crowds in Zanzibar flocking to the island's first film festival

AS THEY turned off the projector we were plunged into the pitch darkness of the African night, with only the phosphorescent glow of the Milky Way for emergency lighting. This may sound romantic all right, but at the time it posed serious logistical problems. Like how to get back to the Land-Rover without tripping over the children who had fallen asleep on the ground while the films had been showing. And what about all the creepy-crawlies lurking in the dark? (Though Zanzibar long ago lost its big cats to the colonial gamesmen it still boasts deadly snakes). Not to mention the threat of supernatural intervention from the witch doctors, spirits and spells that are integral to the island's occult traditions.

But my fears were not really a concern here. There was movie missionary work to be done. One hundred and one years since its invention there are still people on this planet who have never seen a cinematic image, who have never shared the communal power of projected celluloid, and never tutted loudly because someone with big hair was sitting in front of them. For Voluntary Service Overseas (VSO) volunteer Yusuf Mohmoud, of Cheltenham, these movie virgins posed an irresistible challenge. Yusuf spent the first six months of this year helping to organise the first Zanzibar International Film Festival (ZIFF) with the local film-makers and buffs who dreamed up the idea.

"I thought: why should we in London and Paris get to see all these wonderful African-made films, and yet many Africans don't ever get the chance?" Yusuf had explained before we'd set off for the village of Bambi, two hours' drive from the capital, Stone Town. Despite a rich and ancient aural story-telling tradition, it took a while for the Zanzibaris to appreciate the potential of a film festival. "We went to the villages beforehand to ask them what sort of films they wanted to see and they said they wanted films about cholera, and we realised that they were asking for what they knew. They didn't know there were films about their lives that were entertainment and not just about education. They've been completely knocked out by the fact that parts of Africa are producing good-quality films because they haven't had access to anything apart from films from India and Hollywood."

So, as well as the screenings in the main festival venue - the open-air amphitheatre in the 18th-century Portuguese fort in Stone Town - ZIFF had also arranged 25 "Village Panoramas" (one of them cancelled due to a cholera outbreak), to bring African-made films to an African audience. Which is how I came to be in Bambi watching a bad kung fu movie and eating a delicious coconut curry by the flickering light of a 35mm film projector.

By late afternoon, when we had arrived, a crowd of around 500 had already gathered on the equivalent of the village green. As the sun set that grew to two thousand eager cineastes who arranged themselves in a horseshoe around the screen, the women resplendent in vividly-coloured cotton shawls decorated with moralistic Kiswahili slogans ("Drink water from the well that will satisfy your heart" said one). Local children sang and performed for the village elders, seated behind a row of school desks, to kill the time before darkness would allow the films to begin, the crepuscular light also heralding the arrival of insects loud enough to drown the PA system. I asked one of the children, Hassan, whether he had seen a film before. He hadn't but he seemed nonplussed by the commotion and carried on playing football.

The first feature was a cartoon, Karate Kid, made by Unicef to warn children of the dangers of drug abuse, which the crowd responded to with cheers, boos and laughter. Black Ninja Group, a Dar es Salaam-made feature followed and was possibly the worst film I had ever seen - a nonsensical tale of, mainly, endlessly kung fu bouts between baddies in balaclavas and the policemen, and edited with an axe. But that, too, went down well with the Bambi audience who, as the dilapidated projector was eventually turned off at around midnight, made off into the night still shouting and laughing, until all we could hear were the insects and distant reggae.

Zanzibar's climate is not best faced with a roaring hangover, so I left it late before venturing from my elegant, cool Moorish-style hotel, the Dhow Palace, the next day. But, with the festival over, the challenge of Stone Town could be denied no longer. I spent a day exploring - a euphemism for getting lost in - its maze of unnamed alleys, wandering around with my mouth open like a whale trawling for plankton, struck dumb by the vertiginous, crumbly coral rag and mangrove wood houses (often host to parasitic plants and trees), ornate balconies and spicy bazaars. Zanzibar is famed for its heavy, brass-studded Arabic doors, intricately carved with Quranic quotes, from the wood of the jackfruit tree, and plenty survive. Though often narrow enough for outstretched arms to touch both walls (while sagging overhead powerlines brush your head), these compelling alleys thronged with bicycles and mopeds, tooting horns and ringing bells to clear a speedy path where none seemed possible.

Before leaving England my doctor had advised me to take Larium, a fierce anti-malaria prophylactic which induces, in some, psychosis bordering on schizophrenia (friends had queued to tell me horror stories about people they knew who had taken the drug and were now incarcerated in various African mental institutes), and I became increasingly disorientated by this labyrinth and its heady odours - charcoal smoke, drains, spices, rotting fruit - in characteristic hypochondriacal style I began to doubt my sanity. Only the friendly greetings of "Jambo!" from everyone from the boys squeezing sugar cane through a mangle, to chess players outside a bar, stemmed the paranoia. Even the touts were laid-back: "So, are you coming to the beach with us tomorrow?"

I had expected to find some anti-government feeling among the graffiti, but despite the current President, Salmin Amour, having fiddled the 1995 election (both the EU and the US have imposed sanctions on Zanzibar, which has a separate legislature from mainland Tanzania) and imprisoned 14 members of the opposition for treason, I saw nothing to indicate unrest aside from a tiny article from the Khaleej Times - "Question Mark Over Zanzibar Poll" - dated 29 October 1995, posted on a wall. However, one aid worker I had bumped into at my hotel, Trevor Jaggar of the Britain- Zanzibar Society, claimed that Zanzibar was a "simmering hotbed" of revolution. It was only a matter of time, he said, before the locals began to resent the frequent disappearance of dissenters. And, indeed, I later caught a glimpse of two Land-Rovers full of riot soldiers, off to the treason trial. As they drove away two soldiers fell off the back. The oblivious driver left them to trudge behind awkwardly with their shields and helmets in classic Key Stone Cops-style.

At the town museum I found the usual array of dusty taxidermy, including a now-extinct Zanzibar leopard shot by the Hon W Grazebrook. "They are frequently met," he had commented blithely upon its presentation. The partial skeleton of a dodo also caught my eye, but the neighbouring Peace Museum held the most interesting exhibits: charms and potions used by local witch doctors to exorcise devils, make the wearer invisible or stop quarrels; a circumcision knife; and a letter from Livingstone acknowledging receipt of 42 silver medals - clearly vital to exploration of the African interior.

Up until the end of the 19th century Zanzibar was a strategic base for various invaders, including Omani Arabs (over 95 per cent of a population of one million remain Muslim), the Portuguese, British and Dutch, as well as a frenetic market for slaves, ivory, cloves, gold, silk and the countless other currencies of past empires. Those empires are, for my money, evoked more tangibly here than any place I have ever visited. At night, for instance, walking back from Stone Town's unexpectedly excellent restaurants during one of the regular power cuts, it wasn't difficult to conjure conquistadors, pirates or even Livingstone and Stanley passing in the shadows. (Though I expect a few beers helped.) Zanzibar's intrinsic cinematic potential means, now the film festival has opened the eyes of the African film world to the island's time warp locations and rich story-telling tradition, it can only be a matter of time before the place is clogged with winnebagos, and those alleyways resound relentlessly to the sound of clapperboards.

FACT FILE

zanzibar

When to go

Aim to go during the dry seasons from December to February or June to October. In the wet seasons the hotels are empty, and the downpours are still interspersed with brilliant sunshine.

Getting there

There are no direct flights to Zanzibar from Europe. Your best option is to fly via Nairobi and go by Kenya Airways or Air Tanzania to the island. Book through Somak (tel: 0181 903 8526), who can also arrange accommodation. Flight-only prices are currently pounds 475, but will increase to about pounds 700 over Christmas.

The excellent Gulf Air (tel: 0171 408 1717) also flies from Europe. Return prices (changing planes in Abu Dhabi or Muscat) for low season in November would be pounds 523 + pounds 28. If you want the scenic route, you could take the wonderful Nairobi-Mombasa train and fly from Mombasa with Kenya Airways. Another option is to take a ferry from Dar es Salaam ($25 one way), although this choice was regretted by most people I met. A useful starting point is the Africa Travel Centre (tel: 0171 387 1211).

Further information

A three-month visa from the Tanzanian embassy (open mornings only - 43 Hertford St, London W1Y 8DB; tel: 0171 499 8951) costs pounds 38. Further information from Tanzanian Tourist Office (80 Borough High St, London SE1 1LL (tel: 0171 407 0566).