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Hors Pistes
Le silence des bêtes
L'hypothèse
12 December Wednesday, 19:00
Marie Voignier
France, 2011, 78'
With Turkish subtitles
South-eastern Cameroon. A French zoologist investigates stories from pygmies about a prehistoric monster. For years, he has crossed the jungle back and forth looking for the unknown animal: the Mokélé-Mbembé, partly rhinoceros, partly crocodile, partly snake. His quest guarantees many humorous moments. The Loch Ness monster, the abominable snowman, Bigfoot: they exist in myths, sagas and legends. Deep in the jungle in the south-east of Cameroon, the French zoologist and explorer Michel Ballot has for years been looking for proof of the existence of another such mythical being, the Mokele-Mbembe. It's like a rhinoceros with the tail of a crocodile and the head of a snake - at least that is how the pygmies describe this giant dinosaur, which apparently can even change its shape. In this occasionally comic documentary essay, Ballot turns out to be a tenacious investigator, who cross-examines the local population keenly and wants to install cameras to capture the Mokele-Mbembe. The French filmmaker Marie Voignier follows him without commentary, adding mystery to her portrait. Is the Mokele-Mbembe pure fiction, or does he perhaps really exist? The film confronts the empirically inclined Westerner and the pygmies, for whom tradition counts.
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