“A film that will make you believe in the power of cinema again.”

“You can’t just keep on telling yourself that the international world wants to see this.”

There is a certain irony in a line like this when it’s in a film that is selected for one of the most prestigious festivals in the world. But there is also a truth in it, and it is exactly what director Damien Hauser has done in his fourth film Memory of Princess Mumbi. Even though Hauser is Swiss-Kenyan, the film is Kenyan through and through, and seeing that country’s cinema at a big European festival is rare. The statement that provokes this response is that Western audiences want pain and drama, but that this is a Kenyan film, and the counter argument is to make a film that locals want to see. Whether that is true when it comes to this project specifically is anyone’s guess, but the film is certainly a unique approach to cinema that you don’t often see at big festivals, and it’s refreshing. Hauser proves that a micro-budget doesn’t have to stand in the way of creativity and imagination, and he has crafted a joyful work that can pull anyone out of a funk.

Depression is actually one of the main topics of the film, and woven into a wild narrative about a princess in an African kingdom who wants to go back to her acting career after her marriage to the king’s heir. But Memory of Princess Mumbi is far from the straightforward tale of drama and pain that the directors of the film-within-a-film want to make (the process of creating this mise en abyme takes up a good chunk of the runtime). To fully explain the plot, we need to unpeel several layers.

The year is 2099, roughly two decades after a war against technology was waged across the world. Technology had caused an addiction to media consumption, which led to a global depression amongst the people. The conservatives won this war, and instated a ban on technology (an interesting twist given the political leanings of current technology leaders); in the aftermath of the war several retro-futuristic kingdoms rose up in Africa. Mumbi was born in Umata, one such kingdom, and it is her life story that documentarians Kuve and Damien (the latter played by Hauser himself) want to tell. Memory of Princess Mumbi takes on the form of a mockumentary, in which Kuve uses footage of his time spent with Mumbi to illustrate the tragedy of her life and death at the dawn of the 22nd century. Five years prior, as he and his co-director Damien are preparing to shoot a documentary about the depression the war has caused amongst the people of Umata, they are scouting for somebody who can interview those who survived the war. This is how they meet Mumbi, a young actress, who they instantly add to their team, seeing the immediate chemistry between her and Kuve.

As they start to interview the citizens of Umata, it turns out these people aren’t depressed at all; they are rather proud of having fought in this war. Kuve and Damien use AI to change the mood of their subjects in order to fit the narrative of their film. This raises the ire of Mumbi, which leads to the aforementioned argument about what audiences want to see. How they can use AI in a world where technology is banned is probably a plot hole the size of Africa, but easily overlooked once you have fallen for the film’s infectious enthusiasm. In any case, Mumbi manages to steer them away from the documentary and morph it into a feature film with her and Kuve, who have fallen in love, in the lead roles. Yet her fateful twenty-first birthday is approaching, the day that she is supposed to marry Umata’s prince. The two manage to flee to Nordanien, formerly Switzerland, where Mumbi slowly slides into a depression after finding out that Damien has finished the film to great success, but has replaced Mumbi’s face using AI.

Incredibly, this only covers about half of the film’s short runtime, and it’s safe to say that the ‘documentary’ takes a more somber turn in its second half. The filmmaking, however, remains on point. How Hauser has managed to make this film on such a meagre budget is astounding, although its extensive use of AI to create the fantastical backgrounds of the kingdom definitely must have helped. Just as the film is a layer cake of narrative and meta elements, so is its view on the use of AI in filmmaking. The backdrops Hauser has created look gorgeous, but also obviously a product of AI. Its use was probably necessary to even get this film made, but it also shows what kind of work that leads to. Within the narrative, the film itself is critical of the use of artificial intelligence in cinema. This presents an interesting conundrum: should we discourage the use of AI, even if it’s by micro-budget films like this one, and thus potentially miss out on creative and singular talents like Hauser? Or should we roll out the carpet for this technology, even for big budget productions, resulting in the loss of work for behind-the-camera roles, from matte painters to editors (Kuve and Damien use an AI auto-editing tool that creates a first cut of their film, something not too far-fetched given the rapid development of AI tools right now)? One of the deeper-lying dangers the film touches upon is the depression caused by addictive media consumption that started the war in the first place, a nod to the current (and increasing) use of AI to create highly addictive content on platforms like YouTube. At the moment this still is primarily aimed at young children, but content for older audiences is steadily creeping in.

The poignancy of the film aside, Memory of Princess Mumbi is also simply a joy to watch, primarily because Hauser and his collaborators have let their imaginations run wild in a way a Hollywood studio or even the international workshop circuit would never allow. The AI creations are highly imaginative, the ‘plot’, with its film-within-a-film-within-a-film structure, is deliciously intricate, and Hauser is not afraid to throw in a musical number, a nod to silent cinema, made-up biographies of non-existing filmmakers, and animated art. Sure, it doesn’t all look as slick as a film with a bigger budget, but it is definitely more engaging than the kind of ‘pain and drama’ production that floods festivals these days. This is the kind of film people want to see, whether they live in Kenya or on Venice’s Lido. Its unique and playful approach makes it stand out from the crowd, with creativity behind and in front of the camera making it an irresistible watch. Shandra Apondi’s charisma bursts through the screen in her performance of the titular character, and Ibrahim Joseph as Kuve and later in the film Mr. Legacy as the wonderfully named ‘prince Prince’ match her naturalism. Whether their interactions are scripted or largely improvised is unclear, but in either case it shows the immense talent present in the ensemble; Apondi in particular should have a bigger career.

Memory of Princess Mumbi is unlike any other film. Perhaps it is a work from the future, a future where filmmaking is no longer dependent on large budgets, and where creativity and imagination coupled with a group of engaging actors is enough to make a film that the masses can enjoy. This film could be a trailblazer, something that makes other budding filmmakers take a look at their savings account and think, “I can do something like that.” If we look past the imperfections, or even embrace them, Memory of Princess Mumbi is a film that will make you believe in the power of cinema again. After Bi Gan’s dazzling ode to the artform in Cannes, Hauser’s smaller-scale love letter to it coming in the same year is a true gift to cinephiles.