Yaaba

Twelve-year-old Bila calls Sana by the name of Yaaba, which is the Moorish word for grandmother. She is ostrazised by the village, accused of being a witch. The film depicts the growing friendship between the boy and an elderly woman in a primitive village community. Their experiences together, frequently of a comic nature, strengthen the bonds between them, inspiring a growth of mutual respect and trust. Yaaba is based on recollections and stories from the director's own childhood.

Comment:
The film is skillfully poised between two traps: the exotic and the pathetic. It tells a plain, soft-spoken story with no empty gestures. And it is a beautiful film, with images of striking purity: the lake which Yaaba crosses, or the desert in which Bila and Yaaba rove around. Yaaba is on a level with the great childhood portrayals in film history, in which we see life through the eyes of a child and quickly discover which adults are still children at heart.

ASW