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A daring celebration of taking over area in locations you’re advised you don’t belong, “Hawa” is a crowd-pleasing fable with a fluffy coronary heart, fierce spirit and disarming humorousness. These qualities additionally outline the titular heroine of Maïmouna Doucouré’s beautiful sophomore characteristic, co-written by Doucouré, Alain-Michel Blanc, Zangro and David Elkaim. Hawa is each delicate and fearless whereas she roams the streets of Paris on a life-defining quest along with her reliable scooter and unapologetic blonde afro, seeing the world by way of her idiosyncratic coke-bottle glasses as she earns the assistance and goodwill of a parade of strangers.
Don’t be alarmed by the crowded group of writers right here — regardless of the numerous cooks within the kitchen, “Hawa,” below the baton of Doucouré, is as coherently envisioned and tightly structured as films come. You would possibly recall the gifted Doucouré’s identify and acknowledge her model from her debut “Cuties,” a prize winner on the 2020 Sundance Movie Pageant whose destiny was overshadowed by an unfair and misguided controversy that erupted about it later that 12 months. In her equally assured second characteristic, the defiant Doucouré places to work the identical vigorous essence on the core of her earlier movie, one which comprehends the sophisticated headspace of burdened, modern younger ones and splits the distinction between a contact of magical realism and social drama.
The no-nonsense teen Hawa — somebody who doesn’t have time for pity nor for senseless blabber — is portrayed by Sania Halifa (a first-timer whom the director found through casting name) with outstanding finesse and lived-in authenticity. A resourceful loner, the orphan-to-be lives along with her terminally unwell grandmother Maminata (the well-known Malian singer Oumou Sangaré, a fascinating display screen presence along with her highly effective voice and marvelous conventional frocks) and works at a neighborhood grocery retailer to make ends meet whereas the duo searches for an appropriate adoptive house for the distinctive child. Whereas she usually will get bullied as a result of her distinctive appears to be like and albino complexion, Hawa proves to be nobody’s pushover — decided to face tall in entrance of anybody who dares to mess along with her, she fights again with dignity, defeating the meanies round her with slightly assist from her shy pal Erwan (Titouan Gerbier).
It’s by way of that assertive disposition that Hawa decides to take issues that must do along with her future into her personal palms. Displeased by the record of potential adopters, all in line to offer her a house after her grandmother passes, she concludes that there would solely be one particular person on the earth she’d belief as her new father or mother: America’s former First Woman, Michelle Obama. In spite of everything, doesn’t she have already got sufficient empty area in her massive home, along with her mature daughters now not dwelling at house? Perennially taken by Hawa, Erwan agrees, changing into in entrance of our eyes a mannequin compassionate pal so few of us in the actual world have been fortunate sufficient to have the help of.
Bolstered by DP Antoine Sanier’s agile lens — which pulls off quite a few really tough and complicated city set-pieces — and the paranormal cues of a musical rating by Erwann Chandon and Niko Noki, Doucouré vivaciously follows Hawa in and round Paris because the younger lady desperately tries to cross paths with Michelle Obama, who occurs to be on the town for a guide tour. All through the more and more eventful slice of her life, we watch Hawa muscle her manner in to the bowels of a high-profile live performance by French singer Yseult (taking part in herself), sneak right into a kids’s hospital to ship a hearty adoption pitch to Michelle, confront safety bigwigs at unique galas, attain the help of famed astronaut Thomas Pesquet (taking part in himself) and even find yourself on the chaotic Charles de Gaulle Airport’s baggage carousel in the course of the movie’s nail-biter climax. That final tour could be too farfetched even in a pre-9/11 world. However Doucouré movies the incident, nimbly edited by Nicolas Desmaison, with such good-natured resolve you could’t assist however purchase the chance of a headstrong child in some way ending up subsequent to Obama’s non-public jet, unassisted and unhurt.
All through, Doucouré places Hawa’s thick set of glasses to good use in manipulating her typically blurry imaginative and prescient, doing so each bodily and metaphorically in service of her modern-day fairytale a few rebellious soul in the hunt for her place on the earth. As soon as that place comes into sharp focus, the uplifting emotional sway Doucouré sneakily seizes is just breathtaking.
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