Be my Flame

Rick Politician
March 20, 2002
History 152
Extra Credit -- Flame
In director Ingrid Sinclair’s 1996 film, Flame, the story of Florence and Nyasha’s journey into womanhood brings to light many of the issues Africans dealt with during the end of the colonial era and the time that followed when new nations rose from the ashes of a fallen colonial governments.
The Zimbabwean revolution led by the ZANU against the white ex-British government and the Mau Mau rebellion share many similarities.  Comrade Danger’s inspiring speech to the home village of Florence and Nyasha gave the movement a grass roots appearance that resembled the Kikuyu farmers’ nightly initiations of peasants.
The war itself also resembles the one in Kenya.  The African soldiers fight in the Rhodesian bush, using guerilla warfare to launch surprise attacks upon the whites and then retreating back into safety.  Women also play a vital role as soldiers in Rhodesia much like the Kikuyu women play a vital role as soldiers and suppliers of food and supplies.  Florence becomes a legend as a guerilla soldier in the Zimbabwean revolution.  In Kenya, Wanjiru Nyamarutu plays an important part in the war as she organizes the other women for gathering information, supplies, money and food for the soldiers fighting in the forest.
After the war, the distribution of wealth and power follows along the same lines in both Rhodesia and Kenya.  The peasants who join the grass roots movement in Rhodesia and win the war for the country have freedom from white oppression, yet they are not economically better off.  This can be seen as Comrade Danger loses his job not long after his return back to his village and is reduced to spending his days hanging out in front of the village store.  Furthermore, the soldiers are not shown respect for what they have done as the “Hero’s Day” ceremonies do not include any of the grass roots fighters.  This situation resembles that of the Mau Mau who were often worse off economically after their war finished and politically lacked any real representation.  
            The issues brought up in this film also mirror that of many brought up by Amy Stambach in Lessons from Mount Kilimanjaro.  Florence represents the more traditional thinking African woman who interests focus on finding a husband while in contrast Nyasha takes a committed stand towards her own goal of finishing school.  Stambach also brings up this contrast between the elders of in village of Ndala, who believe young women should focus on making superb wives and mothers, and the young women that believe education will be their husbands.
            As youths, Florence and Nyasha wear short, Western style dresses and lipstick.  These traits are picked up from Western fashion and the girls emulate the fashion because they think it is beautiful.  Florence’s mother reprimands the two girls for wearing lipstick and Florence’s father disapproves of the short dresses.  This situation echoes that of the children in Ndala village.  They listen to pop music by Bobby Brown, dress like Westerners and dance in provocatively like Westerners.  Many of the adults in Ndala are afraid that their own culture and tradition will be replaced by the Western world’s culture and they do not know what their society would be like after that happens.
Also brought up in Flame are gender issues that reveal the separation in Zimbabwean society between men and women.  An excellent example of this separation exists at the military training camp in Mozambique. All of the officers are males and no women are respected enough to hold a seat of authority or even to fight in the war.  The women train for an entire year at the camp and are not even shown how to use rifles while in the same period many new groups of men come to the camp, train and then are sent off to fight.  During this year, the women are fed so little that they stop experiencing monthly hormonal cycles. Even more, the men continuously prey upon by the women to amuse their sexual whims.  Florence, herself, falls victim to rape by one of the officers. 
The prejudice of the men in the camp reveals the deep cultural belief in the inferiority of women as well as African men’s acceptance of non-marital sex.  This female inferiority is an issue that exists in almost all the books we have read this year.  In Things Fall Apart, the wives of Okonkwo are at his beck and call and submit to all his decisions for the family.  In Houseboy, the Sophie and Kalisia are both African women who by sleeping with men support themselves.  Many of the schoolgirls in Stambach’s ethnography afford schooling through sleeping with older men who pay for their schooling, clothes and supplies. 
            Men holding control over women and using them for sex continues has been an issue in Africa since the pre-colonial period and has continued to be through the colonial period into the present.  The film Flame illustrates this issue as well as many others like Western culture’s affect on youth and a war’s affect on the people from a grass roots perspective.  Flame shows that full length feature film have become another informative medium through which interested parties can learn about African history and current events.