Event

Wah-Wah

An audience favorite at the Edinburgh festival, this is a directorial debut by one of Britain's best loved actors, Richard E. Grant. Wah-Wah, a semi-autobiographical tale of Grant's youth in Swaziland, begins in the late 1960s, just as Swaziland is about to receive independence from Great Britain, and a young man is about to receive his independence from childhood. Part drama, part comedy, the film satirizes the "wah-wah" upper class language and manners prevalent in Britain's colonized nations, and portrays the "white mischief" prevalent in those African outposts. Full of witty and wry observations, Wah-Wah is at heart about love, and the camera clearly loves the landscape and the people who occupy it. Stunningly shot, and brilliantly acted by an ensemble cast that includes Emily Watson and Gabrielle Byrne, the film expertly blends landscape, culture, rite of passage, and humor in a remarkable portrait of people buried in and overtaken by history.