A Time There Was : Stories from the Last Days of Kenya Colony.
(eVideo)
Contributors
Published
[San Francisco, California, USA] : Kanopy Streaming, 2014.
Physical Desc
1 online resource (1 video file, 88 min.) : digital, stereo., sound, color
Status
Description
Loading Description...
Also in this Series
Checking series information...
More Details
Format
eVideo
Language
English
Notes
Date/Time and Place of Event
Originally produced by National Film Board of Canada in 2009.
Description
It’s early afternoon, May 1, 1955 — and Donald McWilliams finds himself with other British soldiers in Ndyeia Gorge in central Kenya. At their feet a Mau Mau fighter lies dying, mortally wounded by their gunfire. Above them all, the vast skies of the Rift Valley. McWilliams is hardly out of his teens — a child of wartime London, stationed to Kenya for his national service. Raised on the romance of Empire, he’d imagined a great African adventure. But the look in the eyes of that dying rebel sets his life on another course. Over fifty years later McWilliams confronts his past with creative audacity and unflinching self-inquiry in A Time There Was: Stories from the Last Days of Kenya Colony. With historical rigour and visual lyricism, he combines his own photographic record of the times with original animation and archival imagery, crafting a film diary of singular beauty and a thoughtful account of the Mau Mau Rebellion — one of the most contentious episodes in Britain’s imperial history. The conflict arose from long simmering resentment among Kikuyu who had lost vast tracts of fertile land to white colonial farmers. The rebels were portrayed as depraved savages intent on attacking the civilizing forces of British settlers, but in fact atrocities were committed by both sides — and Africans died in far greater numbers than Europeans. McWilliams frames his own story with testimony from other participants in the events. Mau Mau veteran Mwaria Njuma, who took the Mau Mau oath to reclaim the native birthright of Kenyans, details the on-the-ground struggle – as a freedom fighter in the forests, and a prisoner in the British detention camps. Activist lawyer Achrroo Kapila, from Kenya’s Asian minority, defended hundreds of political dissidents, including future president Jomo Kenyatta. And John Nottingham broke rank with fellow colonial officials to embrace the cause of independence. In the tradition of his mentor Norman McLaren, McWilliams employs a rich palette of filmic devices, finding fresh meaning in the random gestures and expressions of old newsreels and snapshots, and arranging his evocative narration within a soundscape that features Kenyan and Mau Mau songs alongside original compositions by jazzman Kevin Dean. With A Time There Was McWilliams completes a remarkable autobiographical trilogy that includes The Passerby and The Fifth Province, distinguishing himself as one of the great poetic essayists of Canadian cinema.
Original Version
Originally produced,aMontreal, Quebec, National Film Board of Canada, c2009.
System Details
Mode of access: World Wide Web.
Citations
APA Citation, 7th Edition (style guide)
McWilliams, D. (2014). A Time There Was: Stories from the Last Days of Kenya Colony . Kanopy Streaming.
Chicago / Turabian - Author Date Citation, 17th Edition (style guide)McWilliams, Donald, 1935-. 2014. A Time There Was: Stories From the Last Days of Kenya Colony. Kanopy Streaming.
Chicago / Turabian - Humanities (Notes and Bibliography) Citation, 17th Edition (style guide)McWilliams, Donald, 1935-. A Time There Was: Stories From the Last Days of Kenya Colony Kanopy Streaming, 2014.
MLA Citation, 9th Edition (style guide)McWilliams, Donald. A Time There Was: Stories From the Last Days of Kenya Colony Kanopy Streaming, 2014.
Note! Citations contain only title, author, edition, publisher, and year published. Citations should be used as a guideline and should be double checked for accuracy. Citation formats are based on standards as of August 2021.
Staff View
Grouped Work ID
a8ff6bd6-e1f7-6b16-c9ea-e9e907972f1d-eng
Grouping Information
Grouped Work ID | a8ff6bd6-e1f7-6b16-c9ea-e9e907972f1d-eng |
---|---|
Full title | time there was stories from the last days of kenya colony |
Author | kanopy |
Grouping Category | movie |
Last Update | 2022-07-12 21:18:21PM |
Last Indexed | 2024-04-17 02:31:29AM |
Book Cover Information
Image Source | sideload |
---|---|
First Loaded | Aug 31, 2021 |
Last Used | Feb 28, 2024 |
Marc Record
First Detected | Dec 31, 2012 12:00:00 AM |
---|---|
Last File Modification Time | Jul 26, 2021 06:41:52 AM |
MARC Record
LEADER | 03980cgm a2200409 i 4500 | ||
---|---|---|---|
001 | kan1043291 | ||
003 | CaSfKAN | ||
005 | 20121231183435.0 | ||
006 | m c | ||
007 | vz uzazuu | ||
007 | cr una---unuuu | ||
008 | 140927p20142009cau087 o vleng d | ||
028 | 5 | 2 | |a 1043291|b Kanopy |
035 | |a (OCoLC)914219981 | ||
040 | |a NZEN|c NZEN|e rda | ||
245 | 0 | 2 | |a A Time There Was :|b Stories from the Last Days of Kenya Colony. |
264 | 1 | |a [San Francisco, California, USA] :|b Kanopy Streaming,|c 2014. | |
300 | |a 1 online resource (1 video file, 88 min.) :|b digital, stereo., sound, color | ||
336 | |a two-dimensional moving image|2 rdacontent | ||
337 | |a computer|2 rdamedia | ||
338 | |a online resource|2 rdacarrier | ||
344 | |a digital | ||
347 | |a video file|b MPEG-4|b Flash | ||
518 | |a Originally produced by National Film Board of Canada in 2009. | ||
520 | |a It’s early afternoon, May 1, 1955 — and Donald McWilliams finds himself with other British soldiers in Ndyeia Gorge in central Kenya. At their feet a Mau Mau fighter lies dying, mortally wounded by their gunfire. Above them all, the vast skies of the Rift Valley. McWilliams is hardly out of his teens — a child of wartime London, stationed to Kenya for his national service. Raised on the romance of Empire, he’d imagined a great African adventure. But the look in the eyes of that dying rebel sets his life on another course. Over fifty years later McWilliams confronts his past with creative audacity and unflinching self-inquiry in A Time There Was: Stories from the Last Days of Kenya Colony. With historical rigour and visual lyricism, he combines his own photographic record of the times with original animation and archival imagery, crafting a film diary of singular beauty and a thoughtful account of the Mau Mau Rebellion — one of the most contentious episodes in Britain’s imperial history. The conflict arose from long simmering resentment among Kikuyu who had lost vast tracts of fertile land to white colonial farmers. The rebels were portrayed as depraved savages intent on attacking the civilizing forces of British settlers, but in fact atrocities were committed by both sides — and Africans died in far greater numbers than Europeans. McWilliams frames his own story with testimony from other participants in the events. Mau Mau veteran Mwaria Njuma, who took the Mau Mau oath to reclaim the native birthright of Kenyans, details the on-the-ground struggle – as a freedom fighter in the forests, and a prisoner in the British detention camps. Activist lawyer Achrroo Kapila, from Kenya’s Asian minority, defended hundreds of political dissidents, including future president Jomo Kenyatta. And John Nottingham broke rank with fellow colonial officials to embrace the cause of independence. In the tradition of his mentor Norman McLaren, McWilliams employs a rich palette of filmic devices, finding fresh meaning in the random gestures and expressions of old newsreels and snapshots, and arranging his evocative narration within a soundscape that features Kenyan and Mau Mau songs alongside original compositions by jazzman Kevin Dean. With A Time There Was McWilliams completes a remarkable autobiographical trilogy that includes The Passerby and The Fifth Province, distinguishing himself as one of the great poetic essayists of Canadian cinema. | ||
534 | |p Originally produced|c aMontreal, Quebec, National Film Board of Canada, c2009. | ||
538 | |a Mode of access: World Wide Web. | ||
600 | 1 | 0 | |a McWilliams, Donald,|d 1935-. |
650 | 0 | |a Mau-Mau|z Kenya. | |
650 | 0 | |a War|x Rebellion|z London. | |
650 | 0 | |a Imperialism|z Great Britain. | |
650 | 0 | |a Autobiography. | |
655 | 7 | |a Documentary films.|2 lcgft | |
700 | 1 | |a McWilliams, Donald,|d 1935-,|e film director. | |
710 | 2 | |a Kanopy (Firm) | |
856 | 4 | 0 | |u https://arcadiaca.kanopy.com/node/43292|z A Kanopy streaming video |
856 | 4 | 2 | |z Cover Image|u https://www.kanopy.com/node/43292/external-image |