Konga Mbandu Movies

Mississippi Masala is a tale of how prejudice makes victims and instigators of us all. In 1972, Indian Jay (Roshan Seth), a resident of Uganda, is forced by the bigoted Amin regime to take his family and flee the country. He vows to hate and distrust all blacks--at least until he is able to reclaim the real estate stolen from him by the Ugandan government. Flash-forward to 1990: Jay and his family have settled in Mississippi. Seth's daughter Mina (Sarit Choudhury) makes the acquaintance of African-American Demetrius (Denzel Washington), the prosperous manager of a carpet-cleaning business. At first attracted to Mina because he is fascinated by her African background, Demetrius slowly falls in love with her. The situation causes Jay to exercise the same racial prejudice by which he was himself victimized. Ironically, Demetrius behaves just as foolishly, blaming Jay's ethnic chauvinism for a drop in his business. Both Jay and Demetrius must learn to bury their pasts and their prejudices to go on with their lives. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Director Bob Rafelson fulfilled a lifelong dream when he finally received backing to complete Mountains of the Moon. The film recreates the exploratory adventures of 19th century visionaries Sir Richard Burton (Patrick Bergin) and John Henning Speke (Iain Glen). The heart of the film is the effort by Burton and Speke to discover the true source of the Nile river. This occurs well into the film, after several torturous scenes involving the injuries sustained by the protagonists during other expeditions and their growing friendship (which, the film intimates, goes far beyond friendship). Rafaelson's fascination with this story, and his insistence upon painstaking historical accuracy, unfortunately compromises his ability to make an interesting film. There are so many starts and stops during the first half that we sincerely hope Burton and Speke will chuck it all and set up a pub in Bristol or something. What saves Mountains of the Moon is the rapport between its stars and the brilliant, epic-like cinematography of Roger Deakins. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Gorillas in the Mist is based on the autobiographical 1983 book by naturalist Dian Fossey. Before the book could be brought before the cameras, Fossey had been mysteriously killed; her death provides a logical, if somewhat ghoulish climax to the film. A Kentucky girl, Fossey (Sigourney Weaver) is inspired by famed anthropologist Louis Leakey (Iain Cuthbertson) to devote her life to the study of primates. Traveling into deepest Africa, Fossey becomes fascinated with the lives and habits of the rare mountain gorillas of the Ugandan wilderness. Studying them at close quarters, Fossey develops a means of communicating with the gorillas, and in so doing becomes obsessed with the beasts' well-being. She is so devoted to "her" mountain that she loses the opportunity for a romance with a National Geographic photographer (Bryan Brown). Appalled by the poaching of the gorillas for their skins, Fossey complains to the Ugandan government, which dismisses her by explaining that poaching is the only means by which some of the Ugandan natives can themselves survive. She refuses to accept this, and becomes a militant animal-rights activist, burning down the poachers' villages and even staging a mock execution of one of the offenders. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi