Anyone who lives in the third world could relate to Mandabi. A man receives a cash giro from his nephew who is working in Paris. It’s for a lot of money. There are two problems. One is that everyone in the barrio gets wind of it and comes to the man asking for a loan or a favour. The other is that in order to cash the giro, he has to go through a whole heap of bureaucratic hoops, and the further down then line he gets, the further away the money seems to be. The chaotic results are desperately predictable, as the tensions affect the man’s family and ultimately his personal safety. Sembène’s film is also about a society on the verge of change. Once upon a time, the reach of the state was less invasive. People could get by without needing to possess an ID or even knowing the date of their birth. But by 1968, the time Mandabi is made, that innocence is fading. Now there will be few in the world who don’t have to possess all the accoutrements of citizenship and its clutter, digital or otherwise. It’s a secondary effect of globalised travel, the movement of peoples which underpins the entire narrative of Sembène’s film.
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