Xala works as a great satire of French imperialism. It's also tremendously funny, and the final scene will not be forgotten easily.

"A cutting morality tale that blames Senegal's sociopolitical downfall both on Euro-centricity and African auto-destruction." - Ed Gonzalez

#582

Visually not very interesting, but the acting really hurt the film more than anything, imo. This seems to be a satire on Senegelese sexism, and the contradictions of maintaining a Western style government and economic system, while trying to break free from it at the same time. The situations used to communicate that are interesting, and with better actors and more interesting visuals this could have been a much better film, imo. (probably score: 63)

Less a laugh-out-loud comedy and more a scathing political satire from Senegal, where traditional culture and the corrupt capitalism of the West collides head-on and is symbolised by the impotency curse placed upon the main character. As it continues to its ending, it gets more and more vicious, leading to an extremely disturbing end that replaces the quietness with an explosion of spit.

# 547

The first 15 minutes of the film really tell you what it's all about. I thought this could have been a lot better, but it has some serious pacing issues.

Some interesting symbols and elements of satire, but ultimately pretty boring. The production value can also be pretty low at times.

the spitting was unnecessarily gross. Very long.

607

This felt like a Buñuel film about a culture I know very little about. The political satire was really strong as was the social commentary, but at times the pacing seemed really off and some scenes felt unnecessary.

554

A very funny film about the corruptive influence of colonialism in Senegal. I can't recall ever seeing sexual impotence used as a device for political satire before, or at least not so well. What keeps this film from greatness is a slightly sluggish pace and occasionally amateurish production. It's strange because all the location work is shot quite competently, but whenever they're on set it just looks horrible.