Lumumba

Congo is a sad country which started with massive disadvantages (King Leopold used it as his private route to personal wealth) and never recovered.

The Belgians made little provision for independence, but that is not unusual in Africa and other countries have managed OK despite a bad start. Congo never did.

A combination of tribal and ethnic conflicts, underhand colonial behaviour and Cold War politics meant that failure was inevitable. Lumumba was brutally murdered by his own countrymen with America and Belgium cheering from the sidelines.

Lumumba never had a chance and he made it worse for himself by delivering an un-programmed and fiercely anti-colonial speech on Independence Day. This is not made too clear in the film - you have to listen really hard to know that that is what was happening. As a result of that unwise speech, he destroyed his relations with the Belgians and gave the Congolese people hopes and expectations that could never be realised.

He also made an enemy of the leader of the Katanga region.

He was thus regarded by his own people as having reneged on promises after an impossibly short time in Government and then, having been publicly and privately brutalised by Congolese troops, finally murdered by the Congolese leader in Katanga, who ordered two Belgian policemen to dig up and destroy the body. All true and faithfully, if gruesomely, repeated in the film.

Everyone comes out badly in the film - which is only right and proper. Belgians for practising apartheid before the word was invented to cover the Boers in SA. How could anyone operate a system where, as a native, you had to be assessed to see if you had developed (`evolved' - shades of Darwin) sufficiently to be licensed to have wine in your house?

The Americans come out rather lightly in the film. Maybe it was not known at the time the film was made that the CIA station chief (Devlin, not Carlucci) was sent poisoned toothpaste to introduce into Lumumba's bathroom cabinet (he didn't). By order of Eisenhower.

The Congolese come out worst of all, appropriately, since in the long term they are the ones who also suffered (and continue to suffer) the most as a result of not being able to act together irrespective of tribal origin.

There is still in reality no country that is Congo. It remains a collection of tribal and ethnic groupings. And therefore weak and poor and ready to be exploited. All this is accurately foreshadowed in this excellent film.

A film that is horrific and unsettling, but real. Excellent.

I feel very fortunate to have the chance to not only watch this film, but also learn more about this fascinating person and time. Lumumba is an outstanding portrayal, giving a full sense of the story without falling into the usual Hollywood trappings - yes, he is shown with his wife and children, but the essence of the story is his politics and those of the still-emerging independent Congo. The film is brilliantly made, moving along at a pace that is consistently engaging. I look forward to seeing other Raoul Peck films, as well as more from Eric Ebouaney!

I was a pre-teen when news of Lumumba's assassination hit the news so I very vaguely recall at the time it was sad a leader who tried to shuck the reigns of colonialization was killed for efforts towards independence.

There is woefully insufficient time in a 2 hour movie to completely explain the whos whys and wherefores of a political assassination. Suffice to say the victors write the history and even if the truth were portrayed adequately, who's truth would it be? As the character Lumumba says in the movie, he came 50 years too early.

I found the story fast paced with good production values. It mirrored the all too brief time in power for a promising African leader, and there is a dearth of them lately. That continent still suffers a vacuum in its leadership, a state that will take another century to rectify. The film and life of Lumumba is a lesson of how badly things can go wrong in a climate of conflicting objectives and numerous parties and forces acting in a volatile setting. Congo had just gained independence and tribal rivalry reared its head very quickly. It is suggested for example that Lumumba seek sanctuary in the province of Katanga, where months before he had been refused landing rights in a flight to visit the troubled area. Politics makes strange bedfellows.

The time of the 1960s was the height of the cold war and Lumumba's courting of Soviet aid to fast track his country did not win any favours. No doubt the superpower USA had at least some hand in his death, much the same as Ngo Dhin Diem in Vietnam around the same time. Attempts to assassinate Fidel Castro at that time are also well documented so it may be some measure of just desserts that Kennedy met his end with an assassin's bullet.

Read up on that period of history then watch the movie to get additional value for the time you invest, and then you will be prepared to better understand contemporary events in far off places when national interests are at stake. Oil, diamonds, bauxite, coffee, whatever; liberty always seems to take a back seat when these interests get the ear of the powers that be.

Realism in the film is reinforced with the french dialog. I also understood the subtleties having studied military coups in university under a black professor who came from Nigeria.

This movie is the best movie I have seen in a long time. It is also the best movie seen that uses a drama to tell history, without going to speculation such as with JFK,Nixon or Hoffa. It deftly depicts the clutches that Belgium had on the Congo. It also teases out easily for us the European and American forces that were behind the power the inflict the Congo today. The film was sure to specifically implicate the U.S., rightly so, in the murder of Lumumba. This film could never be made in the U.S. for U.S. film rarely criticizes itself in acts of imperialism and murder. (Save Stone's JFK) It also lets us in on the problems that were present with the inner conflict of the Congo, between Lumumba, Mobutu and Katanga. We can see how precarious countries sit in establishing new governments when their history is one of colonization and those who were the colonizers continue to pull the strings of power and force. The film is excellently shot with Eriq Ebouaney an excellent Lumumba. The cast is great and they really draw you into the feeling of the climate in the Congo during that time.

Again, this is a must see for those who love drama with a correct historical background. See my notes on Quilombo.

To answer the question of a previous reviewer who asked the name of the U.S. official mentioned in "Lumumba", the name of the character is "Mr. Carlucci." Frank Carlucci is reported as having been at that time Second Secretary at the U.S. Embassy in the Congo. Subsequently, among other assignments, he was appointed U.S. Ambassador to Portugal, Deputy Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, Secretary of Defense, and is now the Chairman of the Carlyle Group. It's hardly surprising that Carlucci's biographical sketch on his www.carlylegroup.com web site fails to credit his service in the Belgian Congo. If his name was deliberately censored from the HBO version of "Lumumba" it may have been to avoid the possibility of HBO's being sued in U.S. courts. Carlucci's name, however, is clearly mentioned in the theatre version of "Lumumba" that I saw recently. In the event, I expect that he would deny any involvement in Lumumba's murder.

Others have commented on the evenhandedness with which the film "Lumumba" treats the parties concerned: Lumumba-supporters, other Congolese, even Belgians. A somewhat more sinister view emerges, I think, from the BBC documentary entitled "Who Killed Lumumba?", based on the book "The Murder of Lumumba" by Belgian historian Ludo de Witte. When examined closely, these films demonstrate that the fate of Lumumba and the history of the Congo is not just a matter of black and white. Only Lumumba's murderers believe that.