Vivre Riche, 2018

Vivre Riche, 2018, 53 min. By Joël Akafou

“Rolex the Portuguese” has returned to Abidjan with one mission: to make lots of money. He seeks to emulate the hedonistic lifestyle of a new generation of West African music stars. He and his companions engage in activities like “grazing”, i.e. online scams, taking advantage of the monetary largesse of white women in search of love or sex, whose money they then blow in the ‘maquis’ (bars) or nightclubs. This unvarnished immersion in cinéma direct depicts a changing youth of the Ivory Coast - disoriented by years of civil war they now intend “to cash in the colonial debt”.