Did You Know? The New York African Film Festival Is Touring NYC with a Bold Celebration of African Cinema

Grab your popcorn and mark your calendars — the New York African Film Festival (NYAFF) is making its cinematic rounds across the five boroughs, showcasing the depth, diversity, and dynamism of African storytelling on screen.

Following vibrant stops at the Africa Center, Film at Lincoln Center, and the Maysles Documentary Center, the festival is now making its way to the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM) just in time for the high-energy DanceAfrica celebration. At BAM, the festival takes on the name FilmAfrica and transforms the BAM Rose Cinemas into a haven of African film culture, screening a robust lineup of 51 films — from genre-bending experimental shorts to satirical mockumentaries and side-splitting comedies.

Opening Night features the highly anticipated North American premiere of So Long a Letter (2025) — a stunning film adaptation of Mariama Bâ’s seminal 1970s novel, directed by Senegalese filmmaker Angèle Diabang.

Among the major highlights is Katanga: The Dance of the Scorpions, which just won top honors — the Golden Stallion of Yennenga — at FESPACO, Africa’s largest and most prestigious film festival. Mozambique, this year’s featured guest country at DanceAfrica, brings a treasure trove of cinematic gems including the nation’s first-ever feature film, Memories, Murder and Massacre (1979), alongside historical and contemporary standouts like Kuxa Kanema (2003) and the evocative documentary The Night Still Smells Like Gunpowder (2024), which also serves as the festival’s closing film.

International award winners also take the spotlight, including the Oscar-nominated Soundtrack to a Coup D’État (2024) and Khartoum (2025), a powerful Sudanese story recognized at Sundance with a Grand Jury Prize nomination.

The festival celebrates Africa’s legacy as the original cradle of visual expression — and that spirit lives on in a world premiere collection of short films curated by acclaimed Ethiopian-American filmmaker Sosena Solomon, commissioned by the Metropolitan Museum of Art to accompany the newly envisioned African galleries in the Michael C. Rockefeller Wing. (Solomon, by the way, trekked up remote rock formations for hours to capture the breathtaking imagery for these works.)

NYAFF runs at BAM through Thursday, May 29, and closes with a free outdoor screening at St. Nicholas Park on Saturday, May 31 — a perfect way to wind down a month of meaningful film, art, and dialogue.

More information at https://africanfilmny.org/