Les Fils De L'Eau (1953)
Directed by Jean Rouch
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Synopsis by Hal Erickson
Documentary filmmaker Jean Rouch was producer, director writer and editor of Les Fils de L'Eau (The Sons of Water). The film is a pastiche of highlights from Rouch's earlier films, mostly lensed in French West Africa. Amidst shots of tribal customs and marauding wildlife, the director exhibits the uncanny cinematic skill that had won him so many film-festival awards. For its first Paris showing, Les Fils de L'Eau was released with a shorter Rouch effort, Les Maitres Fou (The Mad Masters). The latter film deals with a native sect that prohibits "graven images" of its leaders -- and backs this up with violence.