Mandabi Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		4.5
Audio		4.0
Extras		3.5
Overall		4.0

Mandabi Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman February 25, 2021

The legendary Stephen Sondheim musical Company contains a famous second act song called “The Ladies Who Lunch”, which, in the show’s original Broadway formulation, featured a searing performance by Elaine Stritch which included Stritch’s more than memorable reading of the line, “Does anyone still wear a hat?” (The trials of Stritch recording this tune for the Original Broadway Cast album that Columbia released on LP back in the day is a highlight of D.A. Pennebaker’s Original Cast Album: Company, which I am absolutely sure I saw in a Criterion press release was destined for Blu-ray at one point, though it’s evidently been delayed for some reason.) In that same general vein of inquiry, some watching the devastating Senegalese film Mandabi might be prone to asking, “Does anyone still use a money order?” Though the film revolves around an unemployed man named Ibrahima Dieng (Makhouredia Gueye) who rather unexpectedly receives just such an instrument of commerce as a gift from his nephew, the hoops that Dieng has to jump through in order to actually be able to cash it become an almost Kafkaesque assortment of bureaucracies mixed with various subterfuges by people who might want the moolah for themselves. It all becomes so baroque that it reaches a point that, as odd as it may sound, the film may have some resonance for Western black audiences in particular who have experienced some kind of obstacle in attempting to do something "mundane" or "everyday" that non-blacks tend to take for granted, including everything from voting to, yes, attempting to cash a check.

There’s obviously been a lot of debate on this side of the pond about “systemic racism” that, at least for those who argue they’ve experienced it in their day to day lives, is considered so subliminal for those who haven’t experienced it that the ones not shackled by it simply deny that it exists at all. There are some interesting analogs to this phenomenon at play in Mandabi, though it’s salient to note that the “systemic racism” in the film isn’t relegated only to erstwhile French “overlords” of the Senegalese people, but perhaps even to interrelationships between various Senegalese in the very story. Almost all of the film’s cast are in fact “natives”, but there’s a subtext here of a onetime “colony” attempting to forge its own identity, which in a way reflects perfectly, if ironically, in Dieng’s own attempts to prove his identity for purposes of cashing a money order which, small though it may be, could well help change his and his family’s life for the better.

There's a perhaps infuriating aspect to the story as it unfolds that may have some viewers screaming not just at various perpetrators around Dieng, but frankly at Dieng himself, who is shown to have a few "issues" of his own. One way or the other, the film offers a really distinctive insight into late sixties life in Senegal, including the potentially surprising fact that bigamy was evidently no big deal, as evidenced by the fact that Dieng has not one, but two, wives, both of whom are on the "eager" side for new riches. This is the kind of almost scabrous critique of societal "norms" and expectations that one could almost imagine someone like Jean Renoir having made in the 1930s, in just one of the countries that "colonized" Senegal, France.

Mandabi Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Mandabi is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of The Criterion Collection with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.67:1. In lieu of an insret booklet, this release contains more of an accordion style foldout, and that contains the following verbiage on the transfer:

Mandabi is presented in its original aspect ratio of 1.66:1 [sic]. This 4K digital restoration was undertaken by StudioCanal at VDM in Issy-les-Moulineaux, France, from a 35 mm interpositive. The original monaural soundtrack was remastered by the Criterion Collection from a 35 mm magnetic track and two 35 mm print using Avid's Pro Tools and iZotope RX.

This is by and large a pretty ravishing looking transfer from Criterion, one that's especially strong in terms of suffusion and general strength of the palette. The swirling designs of some of the women's dresses and even the incredibly bright blues in other outerwear and even some of the building resonate with very nice vividness throughout the presentation. Detail levels are generally strong, and close-up in particular offer excellent levels of fine detail. While grain resolves naturally, it can definitely take on a slightly clumpy, yellowish quality at times, especially against brighter blue skies, as can probably be made out in some of the screenshots accompanying this review.

A propos of nothing other than a personal observation, while I don't regularly review a ton of Criterion Collection releases and therefore could have missed something along the way, this is one of the first releases, if not the first release, from Criterion that I've seen with a StudioCanal masthead.

Mandabi Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Kind of amazingly, the back cover of this release mentions how Mandabi was the first film made in an African language, in this case Wolof, offered here on an LPCM Mono track. There are some slight fluctuations in amplitude which can occasionally lead to just snippets of dialogue being a bit hard to hear, but since my hunch is most people will be watching this with the optional subtitles, that issue probably won't be of major concern. The glut of outdoor material offers good opportunity for both more rural ambient sounds as well as the more bustling environment of more urban spaces. As stated, optional English subtitles are available.

Mandabi Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Introduction by Aboubakar Sanogo (1080p; 29:46) is an extremely interesting introduction to both this film in particular and Ousmane Sembene's work in general by Sanogo, who is a film and African studies scholar who founded Carleton University's World Cinema Forum and Ottowa's annual African Film Festival.


• Boubacar Boris Diop and Marie Angélique Savané (1080p; 19:25) is another fascinating piece, this one a conversation between Diop, a novelist, journalist and screenwriter, and Savané, a sociologist and feminist activist. The talk focuses on what Mandabi meant for African films upon its release and its continuing legacy.


• Tauw (1080p; 26:47) is a 1970 short film by Sembène which focuses on youth unemployment in Dakar.


• Praise Song (1080p; 15:18) feature outtakes of interviews that were part of the documentary Sembène, a 2015 effort by Jason Silverman and Samba Gadjigo. A host of notables including Yossou N'Dour are interviewed.

While this release offers an accordion style foldout in place of the traditional insert booklet, with an essay by Tiana Reed and various other technical data and the like, the real non disc swag draw of this release may be a beautiful reprint of the original short story by Ousmane Sembène that gave birth to the film. The short story is not just a good read in and of itself, it tends to give a little more context and "interior" insight into the characters courtesy of its narrative devices.

Mandabi Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Mandabi offers the travails of a man who might almost be a Job like character, though in this case it's not some Divinity out to prove something putting up all the obstacles, it's the sociopolitical structure of Senegal as well as some of the darker elements in the general moral presentiments of many individuals. The film has a somewhat comic ambience at times, but it's just as much a tragedy, and as such will probably end up being a somewhat bittersweet viewing experience for many. Technical merits are solid, and as usual with Criterion releases, the supplemental package is very well done. Recommended.