Towards the night

working title

Shot in Kigali

The film begins at dusk.

Amdjadi Mugarura, a 34-year-old single father of two, leads a life divided between light and shadow. By day, he upholds a facade of respectability for his conservative family, heirs to a distinguished mufti. By night, he roams the streets of Kigali as a moto-taxi driver, a hidden profession that grants him freedom and autonomy. This dual existence mirrors his quest for emancipation and his assertion of a “right to opacity” in a society still navigating profound transformations, 30 years after the genocide. Rwanda’s accelerated development brings stark generational divides, contrasting traditional values with modern aspirations, under the pervasive gaze of social control.

Towards the Night unfolds as a nocturnal odyssey, painting a vivid portrait of Kigali’s diverse, vibrant pulse. Amdjadi’s passengers—an elder Batwa, a priest, a sex worker, artists, defiant LGBT bikers, an imam, and others—reflect the city’s complexities. Each encounter opens a window into marginal lives lived with sincerity and adaptation, embodying the spirit of a society in mutation.

Kigali’s nightlife provides a kaleidoscope of settings: from smoky saunas to billiard halls, karaoke bars, and hidden corners of the city where the marginalized find fleeting solace. These spaces frame Amdjadi’s nightly journey, while his candid exchanges become acts of mutual liberation. Inspired by the courage of those he meets, Amdjadi begins to reconcile his dual identity, culminating in his symbolic “coming out” as a moto-taxi rider—a journey mirrored by the film itself, an ode to self-acceptance and the transformative power of connection.

Coproduced by Les films du Djabadjah (Burkina-Faso: Berni Goldblat and Faissol Gnolonfin), Karekezi Film Production (Rwanda: Joël Karekezi) and Gaijin (France: Valérie Massadian and Sophie Erbs).

Colonial Remix

(and potentially, a book and an exhibition)

Through a rhizome of works of art from Europe, Africa and the Americas, Colonial  Remix proposes the construction of a sound box in which reverberates the history of  the colonies and their fantasies, from the first Renaissance conquests until today, in  order to better draw the outlines of a mental space of incessant change. 

For it is an irretrievable picture of the past, which threatens to disappear with every  present, which does not recognize itself as meant in it. 

Walter Benjamin, On the Concept of History V

The echo

A little over 30 years ago, still a teenager, I borrowed a camera for the first time to archive images with my best friend of the house I grew up in and which I had to leave. An unusual, very uncomfortable Parisian house filled with art objects, particularly medieval. Recently, the rush has resurfaced. I say that at 50, I will do something with it. I am 50 years old.​​

Mary and Jibril

It’s the story of crazy love. Of recognition and rejection. Of a passion thwarted by the political and societal climate. By shame and things left unsaid too. 

Mary is Parisian, Jibril (يلِِجْبر, the archangel Gabriel in the Koran) is Dakarois. 

Their story begins in the depths of the Atlantic Ocean, off the coast of the Senegalese capital; it ends in the city of lights, between the hospital emergency rooms, the court and the administrative detention center, in blood, fear and tears.