THE GRAVEDIGGER’S WIFE: WINS AFRICA’S TOP FILM PRIZE

A Somali film wins big at the Pan African festival in Burkina faso, The Gravediggers wife is a movie written and directed by Khadar Ahmed, it was in competition with 16 other movies and it emerged victorious.

The Gravediggers wife is a movie exploring how far people are wiling to go for love, it is about Guled, whose job is to wait outside hospital as he has to bury them and what he is willing to do in order to save his critically ill wife.

It shows clearly the struggles Guled faces when he learns he has to raise funds to pay for his wife’s treatment, who might lose her life to kidney failure, ironically him being a gravedigger he has to wait for the deaths of others for him to raise enough funds to sponsor his wife’s treatment.

“It is a beautiful film that tells a story with humanity,” says Mauritanian film director Abderrahmane Sissako

“I’m in awe. I’m speechless. Words can not express my gratitude and appreciation for this type of love from the continent,” Ahmed posted on his Instagram.

The writer wanted to tell this story with dignity, tenderness and compassion, these are all qualities he was raised with, he narrated this story to the Guardian Newspaper. Ahmed wrote this film about 10years ago and he was determined to direct it himself so he had to learn how to be a director and he did in order to be able to direct this movie himself. Ahmed wrote the film a decade ago, but was determined to direct it himself and so had to learn how to be a director, the Guardian reports. The film has become Somalia’s first film to enter the category of Best international feature film at the Oscars.