Not many movies about African dance make it to the big screen, notes filmmaker Chike Nwoffiah.
Maybe that’s why Nwoffiah, executive director of Mountain View’s Oriki Theatre, decided to take his time producing and directing “Sabar.” The film follows a girl growing up in Oakland as she explores her African roots and becomes involved with Sabar, a Senegalese dance.
After seven years of shooting and editing, the film is finally ready for its premier Aug. 2 in an invitation-only showing at the Community School of Music and Arts. Nwoffiah said over 200 people will attend the viewing.
“If you look through a lot of films, seldom do you see films that pay homage to African dance,” he said.
Nwoffiah, who has directed documentaries for PBS about civil rights and the black experience in America, said the film originally was meant to be a documentary about the African dance movement. He became fascinated with African dance, and started talking to professors and artistic directors in 2002, hoping to capture this movement on film.
“There are doctors, lawyers, teachers and nurses who go to the community center for an African dance class after work,” Nwoffiah said. “It’s a way of life.”
After several years of research, Nwoffiah, who is from Nigeria, said he wanted to “have more fun” with the idea, and turned the documentary into a feature film. He started working with screenwriter Cash Nwachukwu to create a story about a young African-American woman, Aisha (played by Bunmi DeRosario), whose life revolves around hip-hop. She resists African dance, until her best friend dares her to attend a Sabar class.
“She shows up at an African dance class and her life begins to change,” Nwoffiah said.
Nwoffiah used to live in Mountain View (he has since moved to Stockton), and still works here, and some of “Sabar” is shot at El Camino Hospital.
The film’s larger idea is that “life is a dance,” Nwoffiah said, and this metaphor is repeated throughout the movie as Aisha’s character develops. Besides training herself to move on the dance floor, Aisha must “choreograph” her relationships with her best friend, her boyfriend and her mother, who has cancer, Nwoffiah said.
“We used dance as a driving force throughout the dramatic story,” he explained. “You follow her struggle with her mom and her boyfriend, but ultimately she is a dancer.”
The film has been admitted to several festivals, but its first showing comes this weekend at CSMA. Nwoffiah doesn’t have a viewing schedule put together yet, but he said plenty of college campuses and communities are interested in showing the film, keeping him “very busy until the end of the year.”
To find an upcoming time and place to see “Sabar,” check the film’s Web site at www.sabarthemovie.com. The film also has a Facebook page that is updated frequently, which can be found by searching for “Sabar” on the Facebook site.
