Tyler Mitchell Presents: Atlantics

Director: Mati Diop

2019 / 105min / DCP

After a group of unpaid construction workers disappears at sea one night in search of a better life abroad, the women they have left behind in Dakar are overwhelmed with a mysterious fever. Ada, 17, secretly grieves for her love Souleiman, one of the departed workers, but she has been promised to another man. After a fire breaks out on her wedding night, a young policeman is sent to investigate the crime. Little does he know that the aggrieved workers have come back as haunting, possessive spirits. While many of them seek vengeance for their unpaid labor, Souleiman has come back for a different purpose—to be with his Ada one last time.

“Mati Diop has established herself as a true contemporary visionary, and I’m equally grateful to call her a burgeoning friend. With Atlantics, we get it all, a Senegalese revenge ghost story rooted in the very real legacies of colonialism, migration, and economic injustice. At the center of it all is the enthralling, overwhelming Atlantic Ocean, a symbol of both escape and loss, almost a character in its own right. I believe Mati’s voice will shape cinema for years to come.” —Tyler Mitchell

Introduction by artist Tyler Mitchell on Friday, May 9th