Program

Háttérzene államcsínyhez

Uránia Nemzeti Filmszínház, Díszterem
Rákóczi út 21., 1088 Budapest

Soundtrack to a Coup d’Etat
Belgian - French - Dutch documentary, 150 min, 2026
in original language with Hungarian subtitles

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01 May 2025 Thursday, 3:30PM

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07 May 2025 Wednesday, 7:30PM

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Description
Pictures and videos

Director: Johan Grimonprez

Jazz and decolonisation are entwined in this historical rollercoaster that rewrites the Cold War episode that led musicians Abbey Lincoln and Max Roach to crash the UN Security Council in protest against the murder of Congolese leader Patrice Lumumba.
It is in 1960, six months after the admission of sixteen newly independent African countries to the UN, that a political earthquake shifts the majority vote from the colonial powers to the Global South. As Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev bangs his shoe in indignation at the UN’s complicity in the overthrow of Lumumba, the US State Department swings into action by sending jazz ambassador Louis Armstrong to Congo to deflect attention from the CIA-backed coup, featuring excerpts from ‘My Country, Africa’ by Andrée Blouin (narrated by Marie Daulne aka Zap Mama), ‘Congo Inc. ’ by In Koli Jean Bofane, ‘To Katanga and Back’ by Conor Cruise O’Brien (narrated by Patrick Cruise O’Brien), and audio memoirs by Nikita Khrushchev.