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Umuja (2022)

★★½ — Umuja (2022)

Umuja is a short film from Togo, running at fifteen minutes and directed by Armand Sossou, about whom very little is widely documented in English-language sources. The film sits within a broader tradition of West African short filmmaking that uses modest, community-rooted stories to address practical concerns, here water access, agricultural cooperation, and the pressures facing educated young women returning to rural life. Togo has a small but active filmmaking scene, and productions at this scale typically rely on minimal resources and local talent rather than institutional backing. The three lead performers, Elom Tideka, Amélie Tamakloe, and Caroline Ataya, are not widely known outside the region, suggesting a production built around local casting rather than recognisable names.

A-Z World Movie Tour Togo https://youtu.be/prpEEDDk7vI?si=WLC2YtGUf8Ezsz0Q A story about a woman called Anita who is out of work. She teams up with a local engineer and together they trade resources and engineering with neighbouring town to increase the yield of their harvest. Simply made. Decent music. Relatively straight forward story. A couple of comedic moments. Overall it's fine.

Rating: ★★½ | Year: 2022 | Watched: 2025-09-12

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