2011 • 24' • French & English
Director(s): Philippe Lespinasse • Producer(s): Grand Angle Productions • Coproducer(s): France Télévisions • Format(s): HD
In the middle of the night they dive and dive again into the murky waters of Lagos lagoon. Equipped only with simple buckets, most of the time naked, they scratch at the bottom ten feet below to scrape up the sand before the sun becomes unbearable. Slowly their pot-bellied ships are filled, one free dive after another, and then they hoist the sails and head back to the village. These forced labourers of the lagoon might be right out of deepest antiquity, with no other power than their muscles and the wind. Thousands of dives to provide the capital’s construction sites with its raw material. Harrowing work, but with a timeless beauty. At dawn, as the Nigerian capital is awakening, sailing boats with sumptuous patchwork sails glide softly to their home port. The men are exhausted. The images are resplendent. Then they must off-load the sand, basket by basket. The boats are built on the beach, the sails sewn in back yards out of rice sacks and the trucks gnaw at the mountains of sand erected by the men. And yet, the whole sand economy is run by women, in this violent country, which long ago granted them equality. Pauline is the owner of a boat, and of a crew. She runs her little business like an astute businesswoman. Without voyeurism, sharing the lives of the workers, Thalassa spent several days aboard these boats in the company of the sand divers. A report on one of the many faces of people at work and an incredible human adventure.
