(Black Tea by Abderrahmane Sissako © Olivier Marceny / Cinéfrance Studios / Archipel 35 / Dune Vision)

By M.R. D’Amico

Even before its world premiere at Berlinale 2024, Black Tea had generated strong interest among major international distributors, a promising start for the film’s journey into the global market. Mauritanian director Abderrahmane Sissako, after the amazing success of his first Oscar-nominated film Timbuktu in 2014, embarks here on a personal journey trying to find “happiness and feeling free to live the life one dreams deep down.” And he succeeds: in Black Tea first comes the atmosphere with beautiful colors, then the taste, and at the end, the sensations. Like in the tea ceremony, Abderrahmane Sissako speaks the language of aesthetics, trying to find a different perspective to look at today’s world.

Aya is an elegant and sophisticated woman in her early thirties, who surprises everyone by saying “No” to the already unfaithful fiancé in a group marriage in Ivory Coast. She decides to start a new life in Guangzhou, China. In this melting pot, where the Africans meet the Chinese, Aya gets hired in a tasteful tea shop (owned by an older, married Chinese man), in the middle of a colourful and friendly shopping mall. In the back of the store, the charming owner decides to teach Aya everything about the ancient tea tradition. It’s really easy for Aya to transform the quite intimate moments with her mentor into love feelings, but reality soons sets in...

Black Tea is definitely part of a new wave in cinema, called “Transnational Cinema.” As Screen Daily defines it: “It’s the interconnections between different nations in a globalised world order…It’s hard to think of many films that are more Transnational than Black Tea, with a Mauritanian director, an African-European-Asian co-production with Mandarin, French, English and Portuguese dialogue…”

(Black Tea by Abderrahmane Sissako © Olivier Marceny / Cinéfrance Studios / Archipel 35 / Dune Vision)

Director: Abderrahmane Sissako

Screenplay: Kessen Fatoumata Tall, Abderrahmane Sissako

Producers: David Gauquié, Julien Derys, Denis Freyd, Kessen Fatoumata Tall, Jean-Luc Ormières, Charles S. Cohen

Production company: Cinefrance Studios, Archipel 35, Dune Vision International sales: Gaumont 

Cinematography: Aymerick Pilarski

Production design: Véronique Sacrez

Editor: Nadia Ben Rachid

Music: Armand Amar

Main cast: Nina Mélo, Chang Han, Wu Ye-Xi, Michael Chang, Huang Wei