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Bookmark this pageBongo Man (1981)
Director: Stefan Paul
Movie review
From Time Out Film Guide
Having to wait ten years before seeing Jimmy Cliff on film again after The Harder They Come was bad enough; having to watch him witlessly lionised is rubbing salt into the wounds. As if director Paul had got his artistic needle stuck, Bongo Man is little more than a repeat of his Reggae Sunsplash formula: sliced up concert footage and interviews over which a narrator/commentator intones lines like 'politicans divide, musicians unite'. Not that it doesn't have its moments, as Cliff is followed through a series of concerts, walkabouts and rasta raps set against the politically volatile atmosphere of 1980s Jamaican elections; most of them spring from the thirteen or so resonant reggae anthems and the odd bit of wit in the face of 'babilan'. But overall it's a sprawling muddy mess of a movie.Author: FL
Cast & crew
Director: Stefan Paul
Producer: Gerd Unger, Edgar Deplewski
Cast: Jimmy Cliff and the Oneness Band, Miriam Makeba, Barbara Jones, Nadine Sullivan, Bob Marley and the Wailers, Lister Hewan-Lowe full cast
Genre(s): Documentaries
Duration: 93 mins
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