“Good Kenyan girls become good Kenyan wives,” but Kena and Ziki long for something more. Despite the political rivalry between their families, the girls resist and remain close friends, supporting each other to pursue their dreams in a conservative society. When love blossoms between them, the two girls will be forced to choose between happiness and safety.
Against all odds, Ziki and Kena fall in love in Nairobi. In doing so, they must deal with the scrutiny of their community as they come into their sexuality, and navigate the forces that refuse to recognize their relationship. Director Wanuri Kahiu celebrates queer existence in Kenya, while also acknowledging the oppressive realities of queerness. Rafiki, a word that also means ‘friend’ in Swahili, is seminal in the inquiry of queer lives in Africa. It sets the stage and establishes the language and required audacity for these stories as they continue to emerge.
Kika Memeh & Ogheneofegor Obuwoma, FOCUS Curators
Presented by
Samantha Mugatsia, Sheila Munyiva, Jimmi Gathu, Nini Wacera, Dennis Musyoka, Patricia Amira
Kenya
2018
In English and Swahili with English subtitles
Book Tickets
Indigenous & Community Access
Indigenous Access Tickets Community Access Tickets Ticket Donation Requests
Credits & Director
Executive Producer
Tim Headington
Producer
Steven Markovitz
Screenwriter
Wanuri Kahiu, Jenna Bass
Cinematography
Christopher Wessels
Editor
Isabelle Dedieu
Production Design
Arya Lalloo
Wanuri Kahiu
Born in Nairobi, Wanuri is part of the new generation of African storytellers. Her stories and films have received international acclaim. Her films screened in numerous film festivals around the world. Rafiki (2018) is her second feature film and was the first Kenyan film to screen at the Cannes Film Festival. She is the co-founder of AFROBUBBLEGUM, a media company that supports, creates and commissions fun, fierce and frivolous African art.
Filmography: From a Whisper (2008); Pumzi (2009); Look Both Ways (2022)
Missing VIFF? Check out what's playing at the VIFF Centre
The Blue Trail
77-year-old Tereza makes a break for the Brazilian jungle in this trippy septuagenarian fantasy, the latest from Brazilian director Gabriel Mascaro is a quirky picaresque, lushly photographed and filled with mordant humour.
Calle Málaga
Seventy-nine-year-old María Ángeles lives independently in Tangier's Spanish quarter. When her daughter pressures her into selling her apartment, she refuses to give in, finding in her old age a new resilience and an unexpected romantic connection.
Streetwalker
Middle class and married, Elena (Miroslava Stern) has been seduced by an unscrupulous swindler, who turns out to be the pimp of Maria (Elda Peralta), a prostitute and Elena's estranged sister. But are they really so different under the skin?
Two Prosecutors
In the midst of Stalin’s purges, a naïve prosecutor sets out to investigate a prisoner’s innocence, unaware of the labyrinthine bureaucracy awaiting him. A Kafkaesque procedural thriller about the pursuit of justice in the face of corruption.
Image: © SBS Productions
Salón México
Cheated by her pimp, Mercedes recklessly steals his wallet and is only saved from a severe beating by the intervention of a kindly policeman. Hard-hitting social realism sits beside patriotic sentimentality and multiple red hot dance sequences.
The Kneeling Goddess
In which wealthy industrialist Arturo de Cordova purchases the titular nude sculpture of his lover (María Félix) as an anniversary gift for his innocent, adoring wife. Soon enough the wife is dead, though untangling just how and why is part of the fun.