Rating summary

Movie		4.5
Video		4.0
Audio		4.5
Extras		0.5
Overall		4.0

Oka! Blu-ray Movie Review

Listen—and watch.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman October 11, 2013

For those of you who are old enough to remember those odd circular vinyl products called long playing record albums, and who had an adventurous musical frame of mind, you may recall a fantastic little label called Nonesuch Explorer, which offered all sorts of indigenous delights from around the globe. Nonesuch Explorer was my personal introduction to everything from Javanese gamelan (a genre I later had the pleasure of actually performing in) to the fascinating chants of any number of African tribes. Of course, someone had to go out there and record these ethnic musics (the actual quality of some of the Nonesuch Explorer releases was rather questionable, obviously done under “live” conditions, and seemingly at least a few times out of doors), and those with a degree in this area are called ethnomusicologists. Ethnomusicology is actually a longstanding (literal) field of study, as lovers of everyone from Mahler to Bartok to Dvorak will already be aware. For untold generations, composers and scholars have investigated the folk melodies that originated in the dim mists of time, and many famous composers, like the three just mentioned, have turned around and utilized those melodies and other musical ideas in their more formal classical works. Louis Sarno is a contemporary ethnomusicologist who first achieved notice for his book and CD compilations, including Song From the Forest: My Life Among the Ba-Benjelle Pygmies and Bayaka: The Extraordinary Music of the Babenzele Pygmies. Though I haven’t been able to track it down online, evidently Sarno also wrote a memoir with the less than hopeful title Last Thoughts Before Vanishing From the Face of the Earth which became the source material for the stunningly original film Oka! (the Bayaka Pygmy word for “listen!”), which was briefly released theatrically in 2011. Oka! offers an incredible array of indigenous African music as well as a compelling story that is both unusual and, in its own way, quite profound.

Larry Whitman (Kris Marshall, Love Actually) is a somewhat disheveled ethnomusicologist pining away for Africa in the basement of his mother’s New Jersey house as he listens to ethnic music he recorded on his last trip to the so-called Dark Continent. Mom (like so many other parents out there) is sick of hearing Larry’s weird music emanating up from the bowels of her abode, but Larry—well, Larry is just plain sick. On his last trip through Africa he evidently gave himself both tinnitus as well as a serious liver disease. His doctor (an amusing Peter Reigert in a cameo appearance) tells Larry that his days visiting Africa are through, but when he receives a mystical message from a Pygmy tribesman, he knows it’s time to return, especially since he hasn’t yet found a storied Pygmy instrument which some people allege doesn’t even exist to begin with.

The film segues without much explanation directly to Africa, where Larry is almost instantaneously magically reunited with the Pygmy tribe whom he had studied during his previous visits (there's a kind of magical realism running rampant through this film, where necessary connections travel through the ether almost like music floating through the breeze). The tribe is dealing with the encroachment of society—as seen by marauding logging trucks—as well as the increasing menace of the ruling Bantu, including the local Mayor (Isaach De Bankolé), a wheeler dealer who is working with foreign mercenaries to get the officially protected lands given to the Bayaka Pygmies opened up for “development”, and, by implication, destruction.

While the quasi-polticial and ecological side of things plays out in the background, there’s a highly unusual but rather touching love story that also develops between Larry and the local tribe leader’s daughter, Makombe (Mbombi). She obviously has a bit of a crush on him, as is depicted in a lovely scene where Larry is offered a bicycle by some locals (for an absolutely outrageous price), something he demurs accepting (or paying for) until Makombe slyly informs him that if he does buy it, he could give her a ride.

Oka! is one of the most unique films I’ve personally seen in the past several years. Is it occasionally heavy handed? Probably—though those heavy hands are perhaps laudable, given the strictures that many Pygmy tribes now find themselves saddled with. What’s more important about this lovely and lyrical film is how effortlessly uplifting it is. While Larry is obviously well acquainted with Pygmy culture, the film has a certain “fish out of water” element that in fact reminded me of another great Peter Riegert film, Local Hero (and much as with that film, the place in Oka! is as much a character in the film as the "real" characters are). Also much as with that film, there’s a decidedly whimsical aspect to Oka! that makes it incredibly appealing and often quite wryly amusing. There's also a refreshing lack of pretense in this film, with some beautifully honest character moments interwoven with scenes of lush jungle environments and a decidedly off kilter sense of humor. Director Livinia Currier manages to capture both the majesty of the setting as well as the sweet innocence of the Bayaka Pygmies with a breezy confidence.

What really puts this film over the top for me personally, though—as an avid musician and old curmudgeon who in fact had many Nonesuch Explorer albums back in the day—is its absolutely glorious music. Bayaka chanting and instrumental music is built out of incredibly long tropes (or so I have discovered after having done a bit of research). With beautiful ornamentations by instruments like the kalimba and lots of wind instruments that more or less resemble recorders, the music in this film just wafts almost incessantly, creating its own version of the already lustrous ambient environmental noises. It’s a symphony of intuition and tradition, one which blasts through artificial barriers of race and place and which speaks directly to the heart.

Oka! Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Oka! is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Well Go USA with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.85:1. The film was lensed by Conrad W. Hall, son of the iconic cinematographer bearing (mostly) the same name; in this case, it's obvious the acorn has not fallen far from the oak. This is a gorgeously shot feature, though one which often looks a bit on the soft side once we get to Africa. Hall's location photography is often filled with an incredible dappled light which creates wonderful striations of shadow striping the dense forest environments, but which also adds a gauzy ambience to much of the film. The village sequences are considerably sharper and better defined, with excellent fine detail cropping up in everything from the bristly fabric some of the Pygmies wear to the thatched hut that Larry lives in. Colors are generally quite solid, though the film adopts a slightly pallid tone, perhaps to emphasize the denuding of the Bayaka homeland. Contrast is excellent throughout this presentation and there are no signs of digital manipulation to the image.

Oka! Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Oh, the splendors of Oka!'s lossless DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 audio mix. I simply can't state with enough passion how gorgeously wrought this soundtrack is, from the luscious ethnic music woven together by Marcus Blanchard and Chris Berry to the nonstop array of incredibly evocative ambient environmental noises, all of which are dispersed around the soundfield, creating a near constant state of immersion. Some of this activity does let up occasionally for more direct dialogue moments, but this is one of the more beautifully nuanced surround mixes in recent memory, one graced by some of the loveliest music it's been my pleasure to hear—ever.

There's one odd thing about the authoring of this disc. The film is in a huge variety of languages, and the included optional English subtitles actually subtitle everything, including the English. It might have been preferable to have had an option that only translated the foreign languages. This is a minor quibble, but worth mentioning for those who ask about subtitles and what is included.

Oka! Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Trailer (1080p; 2:10)

Oka! Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

We reviewers have to wade through so much cookie cutter "entertainment" that when a totally unique and worthwhile film like Oka! comes along, it's like a bolt of lightning energizing our film loving eyes (and in this case ears), giving us hope for a brighter tomorrow. Do yourselves a favor, even if the plot summary above doesn't reach out and grab you— watch (and listen to) Oka!. It is an amazing film experience and one I will be revisiting regularly in the years to come. This Blu-ray offers great video and superb audio and comes Highly recommended.