In post-imperial African rule, a proper modern treatment of the continent's tribal and geopolitical conflicts has evaded Western filmmakers, due in part to overwhelming white guilt. The great writer/director David Mamet has written that the victim narrative panders to the audience ("See how smart you are? You knew the deaf were people too...?"), while simultaneously giving that same audience a feeling of self-righteousness. In other words, stories appeal to liberal sympathies but question nothing. When the BBC-sponsored The First Grader, directed by Brit Justin Chadwick (The Other Boleyn Girl), begins with hazy flashbacks of colonial Kenya, we may assume that we are in for a narrative already well-documented -- that of Africa as victim.
In 2003, the Kenyan government issued a statement promising free primary school education to all citizens. The hobbling 84-year old Kimani Marugue (Oliver Musila Litondo), carrying a walking stick and rags on his back, arrives at the gated entrance of his desolate province's local private school. Greeted by skepticism, the former Mau Mau guerilla rebel -- tortured and imprisoned in detention camps under British rule -- is turned away by the reluctant teachers for not meeting school uniform requirements. However, the impoverished Marugue, already a victim of ageism, remains undeterred. With repeated visits in proper attire, the laconic village elder wins over the sentiments of the primary school's beautiful and altruistic headmaster, Jane Obinchu (Naomie Harris).
The simple story of an illiterate but dignified former nationalist embracing the pleasure and political imperative of education in his later years, The First Grader is an unabashedly reductive "based on a true story," in which politicians play heartless bureaucrats, media outlets sensationalize false narratives, and village locals turn against each other. As a European portrayal of African suffering, the film may be saccharine but ultimately affecting because of the story's simplicity, foregoing any potential political message. The performances on display save the viewer from Chadwick's heavy-handed direction -- a difficult feat to accomplish in a film so adamantly determined to tug on heartstrings.
The spirited Naomie Harris carries the movie on her sleeve. In the hands of a lesser actress, The First Grader would slog. She is simply incapable of telling a lie on screen, imbuing reserved warmth into every one of her scenes. Equally affecting, Litondo's eyes, bloodshot with age, evince a lifetime of weariness; his hunched posture juxtaposed with the vibrancy of his fellow pupils, he holds his ground against Harris even as Chadwick, infatuated by the actor's face, prolongs countless close ups in an attempt to valorize the elder as a taciturn, political sage.
Falling prey to the trappings of the victim narrative, complete with moral certainty and audience pandering, The First Grader does not pretend to be much else. And although the material is often handled simple-mindedly, the film is too innocuous to feel like an exercise in pontification; it retains much of its power when the filmmakers are grounded by Marugue's touching intransigence.
