Ben’Imana

Rwanda, 2012. In the years following the Genocide against the Tutsi, community-led trials for justice and reconciliation continue across the country. Vénéranda, a survivor, leads dialogue between victims and the families of perpetrators, helping others rebuild their lives and look towards the future. But when she learns of her daughter's unexpected pregnancy, she is forced to confront the limits of her own convictions.

Ben'Imana is set in 2012, years after the genocide, and highlights its long-term effects. Gacaca was originally intended to resolve disputes between neighbors: it was led by the village elders, and anyone could speak up. After the genocide, this traditional form — devoid of any modern legal practice — was chosen to convict the perpetrators. The film draws attention to the paradoxes of anger and justice, the pain passed down through generations, and the hypocrisy of forgiveness. Who bears the responsibility for accountability, and how can perpetrators be held to account? While the story of Rwanda may appear distant, it speaks powerfully to questions that remain deeply relevant in contemporary Hungarian society.

Cannes Film Festival – Caméra d'Or and FIPRESCI Award
Karlovy Vary International Film Festival
Sarajevo Film Festival
Toronto International Film Festival – Centerpiece Section
BFI London Film Festival – First Feature Competition

Marie-Clémentine Dusabejambo, born in Rwanda, is a self-taught film director who began working in film as part of a collective of young filmmakers in Kigali. In 2010, she won the Tribeca Film Institute's screenwriting competition, which granted her the possibility of making her first short film. A year later Lyiza screened at the Tribeca Film Festival, and in 2012, it won the Bronze Tanit Award at the Carthage Film Festival. She worked as a researcher on the documentary series Why We Hate?, about the Rwandan genocide, which was produced by Steven Spielberg and Alex Gibney. In her films, she often explores the dualities of everyday life, delicately balancing between love and pain. Dusabejambo was seven years old during the Rwandan genocide, at that time, she witnessed a world falling apart, but in her films, she participates in the building of a new world. Ben'Imana is her first feature film.

Lyiza (2011) - short
A Place for Me (2016) - short
Icyasha (2018) - short

Original title: Ben'Imana
Director: Marie-Clémentine Dusabejambo
Cast: Isabelle Kabano, Kesia Kelly Nishimwe, Clémentine U. Nyirinkindi
Cinematography: Mostafa El Kashef
Screenwriter: Marie-Clémentine Dusabejambo, Delphine Agut
Producer: Samantha Biffot, Marie Epiphanie Uwayezu, Pierre-Adrien Ceccaldi, Marie-Clémentine Dusabejambo
Editor: Nadia Ben Rachid
Music: Igor Mabano
Colour: colour
Run Time: 101 mins