Another Day of Life (2018)

Directed by: Raul de la Fuente, Damian Nenow | 85 minutes | animation, biography | Actors: Miroslaw Haniszewski, Vergil J. Smith, Tomasz Ziek, Olga Boladz, Rafal Fudalej, Pawel Paczesny, Jakub Kamienski | Original voice cast: Kerry Shale, Daniel Flynn, Youssef Kerkour, Lillie Flynn, Akie Kotabe, Ben Elliot, Emma Tate, Jude Owusu, Martin Sherman, William Vanderpuye, Wilson Benedito

Based on Ryszard Kapuściński’s 1976 book of the same name, the animated film ‘Another Day of Life’ (2018) takes us to a particularly tumultuous period in Angola’s history. The years-long struggle for independence in this former Portuguese colony reached its climax in 1975 in a bloody civil war.

In the decolonization process, various political and military movements fought each other in a race to the capital Luan to take control of the country from the Portuguese. The latter group felt the ground under their feet getting too hot and rushed to board their belongings and flee the capital. The country was in chaos, or referred to by the inhabitants themselves as Confuçao: a state of total disorder and disorientation.

The two largest movements, the MPLA and the FNLA, whose military branches were barely distinguishable from each other, fought each other in a gruesome battle that mainly killed the civilian population. Adding further to the Confucao was that Angola acted as an unofficial battleground of the Cold War; the Soviet Union and Cuba supported the communist MPLA, while the nationalist FNLA was supported by the United States and South Africa.

While few dared to do it, the renowned Polish journalist Ryszard Kapuściński left for this country to report. On the southern front lines, he went in search of the defected Portuguese commander Farrusco, who had sided with the poor with a handful of soldiers. Along the way, Kapuściński meets other historical characters who have played a role in this history, such as the charismatic guerrilla fighter Carlotta, who at her 20 years already has a hero status among the oppressed population.

The brilliant animation of ‘Another Day of Life’ is regularly interrupted by interviews with several of these historical figures. This non-animated and documentary-like part, in which the characters look back on the conflict as “real people” and on Kapuściński’s role in it, is of course enormously contrasting in form, but it works very well. The result is that the somewhat comic-like romance and artful psychedelics are given a stronger emotional foundation, making the drama of the story more palpable.