By James Knight and Katrina Manson
Ouagadougou

"Yes, I'm in an interview. No, no, not now. I'm in an interview. Yes, right now. Call me back."

Beer in hand, fag on the go, the twee rings of two mobile phones constantly cutting in, a meeting with Idrissa Ouedraogo is about as Hollywood as you can get in Ouagadougou.

Idrissa Ouedraogo

He is one of Burkina Faso's most successful directors, with eight full-length feature films under his belt – not easy in a continent where film finance is notoriously difficult to come by.

His film Tilai, an emotional portrait of village life, won the grand prize at Cannes in 1990, and Fespaco in 1991.

Despite plaudits and commercial success outside the continent – Tilai filled 300,000 seats in France – he says he is interested solely in Africa.

"I don't want to cater to an international audience. Festivals such as Cannes don't interest me – I've won prizes there but they've given me nothing."



He's a force of nature: impassioned, and angry. "Under colonialism, we learnt the culture of others, but they didn't learn ours.

Colonialism was brutal and savage. Now we need our own films. We have stories to tell."

Ouedraogo may be able to make good on his rhetoric.

Since last year, he has headed up the newly-founded Association of African Directors and Producers (ARPA).

Colonialism was brutal and savage. Now we need our own films. We have stories to tell Idrissa Ouedraogo

Its aim is to reduce the stodgy diet of Hong Kong and Hollywood action movies and trend of cinema closures across the continent.

His vision is for African cinemas to show cheaply-made digital films on digital projectors.

This means embarking on a painstaking and expensive process of converting 35mm projectors to digital ones.

He has completed three so far in Burkina, with a fourth on the way.



He is also encouraging directors to embrace digital, and has backed Appoline Traoré's Sous la Clarté de la Lune (Under the Light of the Moon), one of the Burkinabè films on selection at Fespaco.

"I love the cinema. I learned to work in 35mm, but it's an impossible dream today," he says.

But in this rush to solve Burkina's cinematic chaos, does Ouedraogo miss making films?

"When I used to have films in competition at Fespaco, I had lots of enemies.

Now I have nothing at Fespaco, and I have lots of friends."