Twelve musicians from seven African countries bordering the Nile get together for a grueling hundred-day tour of the U.S. in the uplifting documentary Far from the Nile. Director Sherief Elkatsha embedded himself in the troupe in classic docu fashion, becoming a part of the company to the extent that the musicians accept his presence even when tensions are high and nerves are frayed, making this more than a simple record of a musical odyssey but an essay on the benefits and pitfalls of collaboration. While the editing isn’t as creative as Elkatsha’s deservedly lauded debut Cairo Drives, Far from the Nile has broad appeal thanks to high octane personalities, joyful sounds, and the always amusing opportunity of seeing people trying to figure out American mores and privileges. Winner of the best non-fiction film at the Cairo Film Festival, the documentary will easily slip into streaming sites and v.o.d. following further fest play.
The Nile Project was conceived in 2011 as a way of fostering cross-cultural ties and highlighting the crucial yet fragile role the river plays for everyone living alongside its banks. Elkatsha starts in Aswan, where the musicians first meet and engage in various trust-building exercises in anticipation of the months ahead, when they’ll be working, eating and sleeping as a group in a place foreign to everyone. Hailing from nations including Kenya, Ethiopia, Somalia, Sudan and Egypt, they speak different languages and produce diverse sounds, but they work towards combining their rhythms in a holistic way through a mix of traditional and new songs celebrating the Nile and cross-cultural dialogue.
The overwhelming (one can say obscene) abundance of products in U.S. supermarkets creates funny moments early on, when they’re brought to a Target and express wonder at the size and outward perfection of the (flavorless) vegetables and fruits, and question what exactly is “Chicken of the Sea.” But Elkatsha, who lives partly in New York, is too generous to poke too much fun at American ways, and largely we see welcoming crowds, be it in concert venues, schools or private homes. The tour itself though is arduous, crisscrossing the country with long hours spent in travel, endless nondescript hotel rooms (how many times must they have wondered what room they were in?) and changing climates. Understandably, nerves get frayed, and at times it seems as if Elkatsha, while offscreen and rarely addressed directly, becomes the neutral sounding board to some, especially for vibrant Kenyan percussionist Kasiva Mutua, whose bridge-building and equanimity remains pretty solid until the end when even she gets frazzled. Yet on the heels of a group meltdown, they still manage to pull it all together and let the music transform themselves.
Solidarity was inevitably going to be whittled away by a certain amount of ego, and given that many of these musicians are well-known in their own countries and are used to being the center of attention, working as a collective can be tough. Ethiopian singer Selamnesh Zemene definitely likes the spotlight, and since her English, their one common language, isn’t great, it becomes easy to misspeak. She gets very upset when “her song” is going to be cut, despite others arguing that none of the songs belong to one person or the other, since it’s all about cooperation. Yet the spirit of collaboration is so strong that compromise is reached and everyone agrees to work together, each musician inspired by the others, with glorious results.
The director doesn’t identify the locales – we can divine some by signs and occasional mentions – which probably mirrors the musicians’ own feelings that one place runs into the other, with only the need (or not) for warm outwear differentiating each stop. The diversity of personalities can lead to strained relations but it also buoys the music as well as the documentary itself. Backstories are few because Elkatsha takes a fly-on-the-wall approach, which is a bit of a shame, though with so many characters to juggle it would overcrowd the focus. Given the scarcity of personal histories, it becomes especially meaningful when Mutua talks of her struggle to convince the elders back home that there’s nothing improper about a woman percussionist.
Always front and center is the music, celebratory and inspiringly inclusive. What’s remarkable is the way the musicians manage to bring it all together with each performance, no matter how exhausted and irritated they may have been moments before. Whether in a concert hall or school auditorium, they convey a generosity of spirit with the audience and each other, nicely reflected in Elkatsha’s own treatment of an initiative, and a group of exceptional people, he clearly feels so passionate about.
Director: Sherief ElkatshaWith: Mohamed Abozekry, Michael Bazibu, Nader Elshaer, Ibrahim Fanous, Saleeb Fawzy, Asia Madani, Adel Mekha, Kasiva Mutua, Ahmed Omar, Dave Otieno, Steven Sogo, Selamnesh Zemene, Saber Kawla, Dany Mekonnen, Mina Girgis, Nazli Reda, Andrew Reissiger
Executive producers: Sherief Elkatsha, Erica Laird, Christopher McElroen
Co-executive producer: Mina Girgis
Cinematography: Sherief Elkatsha
Editing: Sherief Elkatsha, Pierre Haberer
Music: The Nile Project
Sound: Benoit Hery
Production company: Katsha Films (Egypt, USA), in association with The American Vicarious
Venue: Cairo Film Festival (Horizons of Arab Cinema Competition)
In: Arabic, Amharic, English, Swahili
95 minutes
