Benda Bilili! Is a
2010 documentary about a group of disabled musicians from Kinshasa, Congo
who use rudimentary and hand made instruments to produce wonderful rumba and
reggae music. The band are followed from 2004 to 2010 by French film makers Renaud
Barret and Florent de La Tullaye as they progress from living on the streets
and practicing at the city’s zoo to recording an album and touring Europe. The
film focuses on the struggles of the various members and those around them and
upon their influence in the city and especially on the young street kids who
follow and assist them.
The band use strange hand peddled tricycles to get about as
most of the members suffer from Polio and are unable to walk. Their songs are
about their lives on the streets from being laughed at for being handicapped to
songs about sleeping on cardboard. Bad things keep coming at the various
members but they never let it get them down and remain focused on making a
better life for themselves and their families. In one scene, the leader of the
band Staff Benda Bilili a street papa called Ricky Lickabu receives a call to
say that the shack that he has been staying at has been burned down. He simply
turns to the camera and says “these things happen in life”. He is later seen sleeping
on the street with his wife and four children.
