This documentary presents the life of Boubacar "KarKar" Traoré, a musician from the West African country of Mali who was popular in the early 1960s. He later gave up performing and moved to France to support his family, and most of his fans lost track of him until he resurfaced in the late 1990s. Despite having lived in Mali for several years in the late 1980s, I had never heard of him. The film shows KarKar primarily through his music and the reminisces of others who knew him, touching on his wife's death and other hardships he endured. My only issue with the film is that none of the speakers are identified; I recognized Ali Farka Touré and Toumani Diabaté, but knowing who the others were and what role they played in KarKar's life would have been helpful. There's not much information on Mali, either; in one scene, KarKar performs for some Dogon kids on the Bandiagara Falaise, and also makes an appearance in Timbuktu, and more background here would have helped the viewer unfamiliar with these areas to understand what they were seeing.
Other than this, the film is a good introduction to a very talented musician that few people may be familiar with.
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- Reviewed in the United States on July 19, 2016
