It is a quiet evening in a typical courtyard in the Hamdallaye quarter of Bamako, the capital of Mali: men, returned from the mosque, sit making tea; children gather behind a television; women hover over a boiling pot. But this ordinary courtyard has suddenly found itself on film. These are scenes from Bamako, originally titled Le Cour to denote both a court of law and a courtyard, a movie that has received much critical acclaim since its release last year.

The film, written and directed by Malian Abderrahmane Sissako, has a specific political agenda: it pits Malians, representing the marginalized of Africa, against western financial institutions in a trial that takes place inside a family courtyard. The Malian witnesses criticize the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) for their Structural Adjustment Programs (SAPs), conditional aid policies that require countries to privatize and implement free market reforms. The witnesses—a teacher, a young man who attempted to emigrate to Spain, a farmer—are those most affected by structural adjustment, which they claim have harmed more than helped African countries in the last two decades.

Although some professional actors were used, most of the cast are real Malians who carry on with their daily routines alongside the more formal trial: women dye cloth, the marriage of a singer and her unemployed husband falls apart, a man lies dying in an adjacent room. Although the film is ultimately concerned with conveying a political message, it is also noteworthy for its artistic merit. The understated shots of daily life and sympathetic close-ups of facial expressions are arresting, and the song that frames the film is beautifully haunting.

In interviews about his work, Sissako, already a name in cinematic circles for his evocative 2002 film, Waiting for Happiness, has acknowledged that his story depicts a “highly improbable trial” rather than an actual political proceeding. We should laud Sissako, who sees cinema “as a vehicle for representing injustice,” for the innovative way he gives voice to ordinary people on a “continent that suffers by force of circumstance.” He encouraged trial witnesses to speak in their own words, so much of the script was improvised. The testimony is often powerful and poetic, as when a female witness states, “I strongly oppose the idea that Africa’s key characteristic is her poverty. She is rather the victim of her riches.”

At the same time, the witnesses are sometimes vague and general in their charges. They rail against trade barriers, SAPs, and unpayable debt. A few specific names are mentioned—Bush, Wolfowitz— but it still remains unclear exactly what or who is on trial. Lawyers representing the witnesses often mention the IMF, World Bank, G8, and “all of their accomplices,” and one lawyer condemns this group to “community service for all of eternity.” But such unfocused invective threatens to undermine the effectiveness of the witnesses’ arguments.

Nonetheless, the fact that the witnesses are neither actors nor experts, but ordinary people giving voice to their suffering, renders us sympathetic to their perspective. An old griot interrupts the proceedings to sing his testimony; his powerful song, though purposefully not translated in the film’s subtitles, carries more emotional import and meaning than any words could. Adding to the witnesses’ palpable frustration are the expressions of resignation and indifference on the faces of those who ignore the trial as they go about their normal lives.

When the Globalist asked if the film brought about any change, Jeep Sissako, younger brother of the director and an actor in the film, laughed and shrugged his shoulders, pointing out that the stone tiles in the courtyard, which were taken out for the movie in order for the setting, as he explained, “to look closer to the earth,” have now been put back in place. “We continue as we did before,” he added.

Ironically, few Malians have actually seen the film; it played briefly in Mali but the DVD is only available in Europe. Matty Diakite, however, who lives around the corner from Bamako’s courtyard, saw the film when it came out for a few weeks in the only cinema in Bamako. “I found it interesting but I don’t think the film was made for Malians to see, we already know the message,” she said. But whether the film itself is an effective means of expressing that message is another question. “If only it were so easy that a film could change the world,” she said, “but I still think this is an important step.”

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