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Movies: Best Movies in Swahili(Kiswahili)

Swahili, also known by its local name Kiswahili, is a Bantu language originally spoken by the Swahili people, who are found primarily in Tanzania, Kenya and Mozambique (along the East African coast and adjacent littoral islands). The number of current Swahili speakers, be they native or second-language speakers, is estimated to be over 200 million, with Tanzania known to have most of the native speakers. Swahili has a significant number of loanwords from other languages, mainly Arabic, as well as from Portuguese, English and German. Around fifteen percent of Swahili vocabulary consists of Arabic loanwords, including the name of the language (سَوَاحِلي sawāḥilī, a plural adjectival form of an Arabic word meaning 'of the coasts'). The loanwords date from the era of contact between Arab traders and the Bantu inhabitants of the east coast of Africa, which was also the time period when Swahili emerged as a lingua franca in the region. Due to concerted efforts by the government of Tanzania, Swahili is one of three official languages (the others being English and French) of the East African Community (EAC) countries, namely Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania, and Uganda. It is the lingua franca of other areas in the African Great Lakes region and East and Southern Africa, ... ()

Swahili is spoken in Kenya, Tanzania, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Rwanda and Uganda and 64 movies (between 1975 and 2024) with this language have been recorded so far. Most of these movies were shot in Kenya (20). Popular genres for Swahili movies are Drama (31), Documentary (15) and Action (6). Rafiki (2018), The Ancestors (2018), Kenya: Until Hope is Found (2023), Hadithi za Kumekucha: Fatuma (2018) and T-Junction (2017) are among the best known & most successful Swahili movies.

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64 movies found (page 1/3):

Rafiki(2018)

1h 22min | Drama, Romance / Love
3.5/5 (with 63 votes)

Kena and Ziki long for something more. Despite the political rivalry between their families, the girls resist and remain close friends, supporting each other to pursue their dreams in a conservative society. When love blossoms between them, the two girls will be forced to choose between happiness and safety.

Directed by Wanuri Kahiu - With Samantha Mugatsia, Sheila Munyiva, Nini Wacera, Charlie Karumi, Muthoni Gathecha, Patricia Amira, ...

The Battle for Laikipia(2024)

1h 34min | Documentary

The stakes escalate in a longstanding conflict between Indigenous pastoralists and white landowners in Laikipia, Kenya, as unresolved historical injustices and the impact of climate change come to the forefront.

T-Junction(2017)

1h 46min | Drama
3.8/5 (with 1 vote)

After the passing of her estranged father, Fatima makes an unlikely friend at a hospital, Maria. Bound by pain, Fatima keeps coming back to hear Maria's tale of the T-junction where she found love and loss in a ragtag community.

Directed by Amil Shivji

The Marriage of Mariamu(1985)

36min

Suffering from a serious illness, Mariamu and those around her find themselves in conflict with their traditional values.

White Potion(2016)

1h 16min | Documentary

People who seek wealth and success through local beliefs - A documentary on the hunting of people with albinism in Tanzania, where the hunter and the prey speak.

Seeds of Change(2014)

1h 3min | Drama

Mbeu Yosintha was made to help farmers and rural communities cope with the effects of climate change and in particular the ever changing rain patterns in South East Africa. The film is a drama using local actors and was devised with Malawian writer Jonathan Mbuna following extensive research with various agricultural NGOs in Malawi. Following successful drama like Mawa Langa this film has already been seen in Malawi by over 10,000 people in rural areas using a pedal-power cinema kit.

Faith(2010)

1h 30min | Drama

A young woman who is handicapped after an accident becomes attached to an AIDS orphan.

Directed by Musola Cathrine Kaseketi

Black Head Cow(2017)

12min | Drama

In a rural Maasai village in Tanzania, a primary school girl is suddenly confronted by an arranged marriage.

Mila Tu. Becoming a Massaï woman without mutilation(2009)

52min | Documentary

Evokes the personal trajectory of a Tanzanian Massai woman refusing genital mutilation. Directed by two NGO volunteers from Luxemburg working on a development project in Tanzania. Released in 2009, this film has been broadcasted since in various film festivals in Europe, on the occasion of different AR actions in Luxemburg and on national television (RTL).

Tebaatusasula: Ebola(2023)

1h 42min | Action

Ebola hunters stomp out the Ebola virus.

Tithes & Offerings(2019)

17min | Comedy, Drama

A humorous satire about a Kenyan charlatan who claims to be a “miracle healer”.

The Envelope(2023)

1h 25min
3.0/5 (with 1 vote)

Bahasha is the story of Kitasa, an elected public official who betrays his family, friends and community when he takes an easy bribe.

Directed by Jordan Riber
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The Ivory Trap(2016)

1h 19min | Action

An action movie about hunting animals.

Kapitano(2016)

1h 32min | Action
5.0/5 (with 1 vote)

New action movie from Wakaliwood.

Zawadi(2015)

14min | Drama, Romance / Love

In the Kenyan slums of Kibera, a ten-year-old boy hustles to provide for his family, taking him away from his crush on her birthday.

Hadithi za Kumekucha: Fatuma(2018)

1h 25min | Drama
1.0/5 (with 1 vote)

A woman single-handedly shoulders her family's burdens, without reward or thanks, to farm her husband's land and keep the family fed and cared for. She finds herself training her daughter to walk the same path she does. No school, all work. Pests threaten her harvest and are exterminated using a loan from the local women's Co-op. But when Manyusi squanders her prized harvest and schemes to marry off their daughter, Fatuma must enlist the help of her fellow ladies at the co-op to make things right.

Directed by Jordan Riber - With Saida Baaddi, Josephs Quartzy

Kenya: Until Hope is Found(2023)

59min | Documentary

Mureithi started this project after the 2007/8 post-election violence in Kenya left more than 1,200 people dead and 500,000 displaced in his home country. His goal: To understand how to confront unresolved trauma and heal — before the March 2013 elections. He has released an early version of the 60-minute documentary in advance of the upcoming elections in an effort to stave off another round of violence. Film critic Roger Ebert called the work "an urgent documentary by a filmmaker I admire.".

The Gift(2017)

1h 25min | Drama
4.0/5 (with 1 vote)

Mashoto’s life in the city is a hustle. It’s a fast life in the fast city of Dar es Salaam. There’s no time to stop and Mashoto likes it this way. There’s no time to think about the people he left behind in the village. Until silence cuts through the city racket with three words: mother has died. With those words Mashoto’s life changes forever. He returns home, to the place he abandoned, to bury his only ally. Yet his mother has left behind a gift. Her voice, her unseen presence, a gentle whisper urging him to open his eyes and strain his ears- to learn the lessons of nature, of the earth and the roots that draw their nourishment from it. Cast out by his father after losing the little money his mother had left, Mashoto must learn to survive from the land. He must learn to face old enemies and forge new alliances, to fight and to love. Most of all, Mashoto must discover what it is he is fighting for.

Searching Nafta(2017)

22min | Drama
3.6/5 (with 2 votes)

Shooting on 16mm film in Mozambique, director Ico Costa explores the textures of human behaviour as he follows young men who wonder what lies beyond their immediate surroundings. In the fragments of conversations captured in the Maputo market, a recording studio and on coconut trees, we find daily routines and tedium lead to chit-chat on desire, money and hope. In the interplay between performance and document, poetry emerges from fleeting everyday moments.

Pale peko bantu mambo ayikosake(2008)

1h 36min | Documentary

In this documentary, filmmaker Bram Van Paesschen takes us to Katanga province, in the south of the Democratic Republic of Congo. Back in the days of Belgian colonial rule, Katanga was a prosperous mining area. It is now a devastated ruin; its vast industrial ghost sites and rusting machinery are now nothing more than a lasting reminder of its glory days... glorious for the whites.

The Day I Will Never Forget(2002)

1h 30min | Documentary
3.2/5 (with 2 votes)

The practice of female genital mutilation is explored through personal stories of Kenyan women.

Directed by Kim Longinotto - With Fardhosa Ali Mohamed, N'Daisi Kwinga

Women of Hope(1986)

1h 1min | Drama, Kids & Family

A black and a white woman meets in Dar es Salam because of their men, and starts a friendship, despite their different background.

Directed by Sigve Endresen

The Brick House(2016)

16min | Documentary

Coming from another country, there is a quest for belonging and an (im)possibility to completely feel at home.

Morning After(2017)

15min | Drama
2.0/5 (with 1 vote)

Michael is faced with a dilemma, when a night of drinking with friends, turns into a sensual exploration of sexual identity.

Chumo(2011)

44min | Drama, Romance / Love

Juma is a poor fisherman who loves telling tales. Amina is the girl who loves to hear his stories. They long to be together, but Amina's father, Ali, wants a better life for her. Ali thinks that he has found this in Yustus, a rich but self-serving young suitor.Juma must put everything on the line to save their love, but he must sacrifice more than he bargained for in order to succeed.

These Hands(1993)

49min | Documentary
4.0/5 (with 1 vote)

A day in the life of Mozambican women refugees working in a quarry outside Dar es Salaam.

Pili(2018)

1h 23min | Drama
3.7/5 (with 2 votes)

Pili lives in rural Tanzania, working the fields for less than $1 a day to feed her two children and struggling to manage her HIV-positive status in secret. When she is offered the chance to rent a sought-after market-stall, Pili is desperate to have it. But with only two days to get the deposit together, Pili is forced to make increasingly difficult decisions with ever-deepening consequences. How much will she risk to change her life?

Kati Kati(2016)

1h 15min | Drama
3.8/5 (with 3 votes)

Bereft of earthly memories, a new arrival in the afterlife struggles to recover the past, in this poetic fantasy that offers a dark reflection on personal atonement in the shadow of Kenya’s violent past. Imagine waking up one day in a barren wasteland. Amnesia leaves you clueless as to your whereabouts, your identity, and how you arrived. A small group of strangers welcomes you to a nearby oasis resort, and they reveal to you the nature of this new reality. You are dead. And this is the afterlife. This is what happens to Kaleche (Nyokabi Gethaiga) in the enigmatic opening sequence of Kati Kati, writer-director Mbithi Masya's poetic first feature film.

Directed by Mbithi Masya

Subira(2019)

1h 30min | Drama

Subira, is a young, free-spirited girl from the rural areas of Kenya. She seems to have her whole life ahead of her, that is, until the death of her loving and encouraging father. Life hits her hard afterwards, with traditional submissive expectations preventing her from leading the life she desires.

Directed by Ravneet "Sippy" Chadha

The Ancestors(2018)

1h 33min | Documentary

This film follows John Kitime, a Tanzanian musician now in his 60s, as he sets out on a mission to put together an all-star band from the old days to revive the classic sound of Zilipendwa music. Along the way, he meets the people who played key roles in the music scene of Tanzania during the struggle for independence and the nation's formative years under the first president, Julius K. Nyerere. As Kitime plays with the band, spends time with musicians and digitizes reel-to-reel tapes from the 1960s and '70s, he reveals a fascinating and little-known story about the power of music to bring together a people and a nation.

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