Chocolat [DVD]

Memories of a childhood in a remote part of the French Cameroons provides the basis for this subtle, partly autobiographical, portrait of a colonial society. France (a surrogate for the filmmaker), revisiting the Cameroons, flashes back to scenes of her youth when her father was a French colonial official. The precarious equilibrium of their household (the mother is attracted to a young black servant) is disturbed by the sudden arrival of a group of outsiders, both European and African, after the forced landing of their plane nearby. The sharpness of the observation and the performances - each of the outsiders represents a different perspective on Africa - prevents the film from sliding into easy nostalgia for a time and way of life long since past. Cast: Isaach de Bankole, Giulia Boschi, Francois Cluzet, Jean-Claude Adelin. In French with English subtitles.