Original poster artwork · Great Cinema Master List
Spoiler-free premise
A prosperous Senegalese businessman celebrates a third marriage as a sudden private humiliation exposes his dependence on status and power.
Read expanded premiseLonger, still spoiler-free+
Soon after Senegalese independence, businessman El Hadji Abdoukader Beye celebrates taking a third wife as proof of prosperity. Sudden impotence—the xala—sends him among doctors and healers while debts and favors expose the colonial habits beneath his status.
Why it belongs
Through ceremony, bureaucracy, multilingual humor, and social consequence, Xala makes impotence a scalpel for postcolonial elite hypocrisy.
Read expanded why it belongsThe fuller editorial case+
Wedding gifts, imported water, offices, cars, wives' households, beggars, and repeated failed remedies connect private embarrassment to public exploitation—Thierno Leye's pomp makes El Hadji comic without isolating him from a wider class.
Major award wins
No verified wins in this six-institution crosswalk.
Awards are reference metadata only · zero points in 40/40/20
Good for
Film Club
Descriptive guidance derived from rating, genre, runtime, mood, and GCML scores.
Institutional reference ranks
Sight & Sound—IMDb Top 250—AFI 100—
Reference metadata only · not part of the 40/40/20 score
Great Cinema Master List scores
Greatness8.8
Engagement8.5
Ease8.4
Wolof / French · Not Rated Narrative Feature Mood: Funny & Lively
