Emitai

Emitai is a deceptively simple story about the resistance, and a strong statement from Sembene about the forms of oppression practised by the French in West Africa. During the Second World War, when French troops arrive in a Diola village to enlist the men and confiscate the rice, the women hide the harvest instead of submitting to the French tax. The situation becomes more tense and the French quash the resisters by firing on them. The Diola elders debate the best response to the increasingly harsh French policies and they decide to consult and pray to Emitai the god of thunder. Tensions increasingly escalate and the villagers bemuse themselves with their unhelpful gods and giving up the resistance.