Moolaadé.

“Moolade” is a film that takes place in a Burkina Faso village. The film addresses the sensitive subject of female genital mutilation. Moolade symbolizes magical protection spread over others to keep them safe. Female genital mutilation is a practice that is common in many African countries, especially countries that are in the south of the Sahara Desert. Through out the film, it is visible that the film showcases that they are strongly against the practice of female genital mutilation with the character Colle. Colle is a village woman who uses the magical protection, moolaade, to protect a group of women. The villagers outside of her believe that female genital mutilation is a necessary act of purification and they oppose her. Colle is one of three wives of a man highly respected in the village. Colle refused to have her teenage daughter to be mutilated due to the fear of losing her, especially since she had lost other children prior.

Colle's daughter, Amastatou, is engaged to a man that is expected to return from France. Ironically enough, Colle's daughter is considered to be an unfit candidate for marriage by the village leaders, due to the fact that she is not “purified” through mutilation. While her husband is away, four young girls escape from the traditional genital mutilation ceremony in fear that they might lose their life in the process. The young girls ran away and went to Colle for protection. Colle uses moolade, the magical protection, to protect them from the elders that carry out the process of mutilation.

Colle's actions of protecting others with moolade caused a huge dispute to break out in the village between her and the leaders. The leaders made demands that the four girls must return back to be mutilated, along with Colle's teenage daughter, and that Colle must end the moolade. Female villagers began ti pay attention to Colle's actions and proceeded to follow in her footsteps by protesting against those that were opposed to it. The village leaders reacted to this by removing every radio in the village owned by women, with the belief that women are being persuaded by their radios. The removal of the radios furthered the protest and created a larger issue. Upon the return of Colle's daughter's fiance, he refuses to marry her due to the fact that she had not been purified, also known as being mutilated. The film concludes with Colle's daughter telling her fiance that she will never allow herself to be mutilated.

A theme that I believe showed throughout Moolade was the exposure of the tradition behind female genital mutilation in South Africa and how much it deeply affects individuals that are forced to go through it. The procedure is a form of bodily harm and runs high risks of killing the young females that go through with it. Colle stood her ground, along with her daughter, by vocalizing how much they are against female genital mutilations. Another theme in the film was female dominance. Despite what they believed in or their opposed views, women were taking a stand to spread the word of how they felt and to be treated as equal. The village also seemed to be showing signs of modernization, by showing individuals owning radios and television sets.

While the cinematography and message behind the film Moolade was powerful, I personally was not a fan of it. It would not be a foreign film that I would particularly choose to watch on my own time. However, I believe that the overall message and the topic of what countries outside of the United States go through was important to raise awareness about.