OUAGADOUGOU (Reuters) - Thousands packed Ouagadougou's soccer stadium for the opening of this week's Fespaco film festival showcasing the best of African cinema.
Local film lovers, balancing children on their knees or squatting in the aisles, joined Western tourists to watch films reflecting African realities rather than Hollywood glamour.
"We tell their stories, they recognise themselves in these films," said Boubakar Diallo, director of 'Code Phenix'.
Subjects ranged from illegal immigration and child soldiers to African village life, and some of the audience cheered plot twists as if they were at a football match.
Despite the popularity of film in Burkina Faso, one of the world's poorest countries, directors struggle to raise finance.
Independent African filmmakers are hurt by a lack of cinemas, widespread DVD piracy and the fact many poorly-funded state broadcasters fail to take up domestic content, especially films with controversial political themes.
"The whole of Africa is a huge market for film. But it is the only region in the world where because of distribution problems and other obstacles, like literacy, there is no way you can make money back in your own country," said American producer Joslyn Barnes.
Some films, even those that win critical acclaim elsewhere, remain all but unseen by home audiences.
"WASTING MY TIME?"
Many in Cameroon see director Jean Pierre Bekolo's work on domestic television, he said, but there is little profit to be made from distributing films to local television channels.
"Africa is in a specific economic situation. Cinema is falling into that," said Bekolo, whose film Les Saignantes is on show at Fespaco.
"A lot of people feel that I am wasting my time in African cinema, there is no way it can be commercially interesting for the Western world."
Away from the independent market, Nigeria's so-called Nollywood has become one of the world's biggest film industries after Hollywood and India's Bollywood.
Its populist films such as Official Prostitute, Blood Billionaires and Sharon in Abuja generally do not make it to Fespaco and are usually sold on video compact disc (VCD) in Anglophone countries, often from roadside stalls.
Many films at the Ouagadougou festival were co-funded by European donors and television channels. Independent directors struggling to find a market for their films, many in French, say there is limited interest from distributors overseas.
"They make political movies and with more political movies, we have to choose carefully to know what the public will react to," said French distributor Thierry Vigneron, who is at the festival to select an African film for distribution in France.
"WAR IS NOT PLEASANT"
Poor production standards can be a turn-off for Western audiences used to slick editing and a thumping soundtrack. Western audiences may also find some storylines unpalatable.
In Newton Aduaka's film Ezra, a former Sierra Leonean child soldier comes to terms with his role in that country's brutal war, fuelled by demand for diamonds. The powerful film pulls no punches.
"I really set out to make a film as honestly as I could. I wasn't thinking what Westerners would think of it. I encountered something which touched me profoundly and I wanted to tell the story. It is war, it is not pleasant," said Aduaka.
Such films help forge a collective memory on a continent where, even now, precious little is recorded on paper or film, said veteran Burkinabe film maker Gaston Kabore.
"What can you do in a country where there is no production culture? And there is no distribution? Should you say I stop making films? You are going to fight to make your money."
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