Soundtrack to a Coup d'Etat( 2024)

TV-MADocumentaryHistory

74%

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Overview

Jazz and decolonization are intertwined in a powerful narrative that recounts one of the tensest episodes of the Cold War. In 1960, the UN became the stage for a political earthquake as the struggle for independence in the Congo put the world on high alert. The newly independent nation faced its first coup d'état, orchestrated by Western forces and Belgium, which were reluctant to relinquish control over their resource-rich former colony. The US tried to divert attention by sending jazz ambassador Louis Armstrong to the African continent. In 1961, Congolese leader Patrice Lumumba was brutally assassinated, silencing a key voice in the fight against colonialism; his death was facilitated by Belgian and CIA operatives. Musicians Abbey Lincoln and Max Roach took action, denouncing imperialism and structural racism. Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev intensified his criticism of the US, highlighting the racial barriers that characterized American society.

Top Billed Cast

Patrice Lumumba
Self (archive footage)
Louis Armstrong
Self (archive footage)
Dizzy Gillespie
Self (archive footage)
Abbey Lincoln
Self (archive footage)
Max Roach
Self (archive footage)
Nina Simone
Self (archive footage)
John Coltrane
Self (archive footage)
Duke Ellington
Self (archive footage)
Nikita Khrushchev
Self (archive footage)
Malcolm X
Self (archive footage)
Miriam Makeba
Self (archive footage)
Dwight D. Eisenhower
Self (archive footage)
Andrée Blouin
Self (archive footage)
René Magritte
Self (archive footage)
Allen Dulles
Self (archive footage)
In Koli Jean Bofane
Self
Gamal Abdel Nasser
Self (archive footage)
Fidel Castro
Self (archive footage)
Conor Cruise O’Brien
Self (archive footage)

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A review by CinemaSerf

Written by CinemaSerf on Sat Nov 23 2024

This documentary is a serious testament to the archivist's art as it pieces together an impressive array of imagery of the great and the good of American Jazz and combines that with some intimate actuality of the turbulence ongoing in the Congo as it strived for independence. Why might anyone care about the future of an impoverished African nation that had all but bankrupted it's "owner" - King Leopold II of Belgium? Well that's because it holds enormous deposits of the uranium required by both the West and the Soviets - and that's just the start of it's reputedly $23 trillion worth of mineral ...