06/02/2013 - This week’s releases feature Kinshasa Kids, Marc-Henri Wajnberg’s musical perambulation, and Frits & Franky, the sequel to the Flemish blockbuster Frits & Freddy

Kinshasa Kids [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Marc-Henri Wajnberg
film profile] by Marc-Henri Wajnberg, an atypical project built as it went along on the strength of various encounters, will be released this week on Belgian screens. When he went to check the city’s pulse to the rhythm of the music that flows in his veins, Wajnberg came across a group of Shégués, street kids often kicked out of their homes by their own families, who accuse them of being sorcerers. Disturbed by this humanitarian and social issue, which is very widespread in Central Africa, he decided to focus his movie not on that particular problem, but on the children. After an opening scene with an exorcism of a largely documentary nature, the film becomes more and more fictional, concentrating on the comings and goings of Emma and her gang, who decide to create a rap band to relieve their misery. They are helped in their task by the magical but not so reliable Bebson, a kind of lunar but funky impressario, whose nonchalance contrasts with the frenzied rhythm of life in Kinshasa. Presented last fall at the Venice Film Festival and then in Toronto, the film is handled internationally by MK2. It has since travelled to numerous festivals. In Belgium, however, the film is being self-distributed by Marc-Henri Wajnberg through his production company Wajnbrosse. It will be released on 4 screens in Brussels and Wallonia, then in a few weeks' time in Flanders.

The other Belgian release of the week is Frits & Franky, a sequel to Frits’s first adventures. After drawing large numbers of spectators with his brother Freddy (Frits & Freddy), Frits is back, this time with Franky, his not-so-bright friend. The pair find themselves with a suitcase full of money, and a  fresh young woman who tags along. The first film brought more than 430,000 spectators in Flanders. The sequel, directed by Marc Punt (co-director of the first movie) is again being distributed by Independent Films, on almost 35 screens in Flanders and Brussels.