"What is displayed in DAHOMEY is a country, a people, in fact, who are deciding the world they want to build and what tools they want to build with." - Robert Daniels, RogerEbert.com
"A bold and memorable history lesson." - Adam Solomons, Indiewire
“In this bewitching work of speculative documentary, French-Senegalese filmmaker Mati Diop takes on a hot topic of the culture wars – the decolonisation of European museums – and weaves from it a beguiling meditation on identity, ancestry and the weight of history.” –Rachel Pronger, Sight & Sound
Wednesday, May 13, 6:00 p.m. & Sunday, May 17, 12:00 p.m. | In November 2021, France returned 26 royal treasures to Benin that were looted from the Kingdom of Dahomey in 1892. Diop's documentary follows these artifacts' journey from Quai Branly Museum to Cotonou, giving voice to the objects themselves through spectral narration—particularly statue 26, who speaks of exile and return. The film captures Beninese students debating restitution's meaning: Can 26 objects among thousands address colonial theft? How should Africa relate to returned heritage? Mixing observational footage with metaphysical meditation, Diop explores what repatriation means beyond diplomatic gesture—the objects carry memory, absence, and the weight of dispossession. This essayistic documentary interrogates whether return is possible after 130 years of exile and cultural rupture.
Awards & Nominations
Winner - Best Film, Berlin International Film Festival
African Cinema: From Independence to Now Lecture Series | January 28–May 17, 2026
This film series explores 65 years of African cinema, from anti-colonial resistance to digital reinvention. Through 14 films from across the continent, African filmmakers reimagine the medium as a tool for decolonization, self-representation, and artistic innovation, connecting the political with the poetic. Presented in collaboration with the School of the Art Institute of Chicago’s Art History, Theory, and Criticism department. Lecturer: Delinda Collier, Professor of Art History. Synopses by Delinda Collier. Select titles offered with encores; encores do not include lecture.
The Film Center is ADA accessible. This presentation will be projected without open captions. The theater is hearing-loop equipped. For accessibility requests, please email filmcenter@saic.edu