ABSTRACT
Jean-Pierre Dikongue-Pipa's Muna Moto was the director's first feature film. Gilbert Doho claims that Muna Moto was shot in a specific context, that of a repressive regime that did not tolerate any kind of subversive discourse. Those Cameroonian films made before the mid-1980s that enjoyed success with a tamed and manipulated national public almost exclusively addressed a few recurring topics and Muna Moto is no exception to this rule. Muna Moto opens with a series of scenes marking the Ngongo, a major cultural (and latterly political) event of the Douala people. Ngando and Ndome are in love and would like to get married, but postcolonial cultural norms dictate that a very high dowry needs to be paid for the wedding even to be considered. From a purely aesthetic perspective, Muna Moto is shot in a cinema verite style.
