“A mind-blowingly rich tapestry of research, music, and the jazziest history lesson imaginable, with freewheeling beats and riffs echoing into today with urgent purpose.” Harper’s Bazaar

The events surrounding the Democratic Republic of Congo’s declaration of independence and the subsequent assassination of prime minister Patrice Lumumba are presented with cool precision accompanied by a soundtrack of 1960s jazz in Johan Grimonprez’s vibrant documentary. In 1960, sixteen newly independent African countries entered the United Nations, a political earthquake that shifted the majority vote from the colonial powers to the global south. Congo became the arena in which the battle over the UN was fought.

As Nikita Khrushchev pounded his shoe at the UN-top in reaction to the neo-colonial grab of the resources of newly independent Congo, UN delegates from African Countries were being blackmailed. In an incredulous twist Patrice Lumumba’s assassination united the Afro-Asian block, and they jointly demanded the UN General Assembly to vote for immediate worldwide decolonisation.

Featuring Louis Armstrong, Dizzy Gillespie, Abbey Lincoln, Max Roach, Nina Simone, Miriam Makeba, John Coltrane, Duke Ellington, Charles Mingus, Malcolm X and Nikita Khrushchev, and many more....

Jazz and decolonisation seamlessly fuse in this upbeat historical rollercoaster, from the producers of I Am Not Your Negro.

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