Xala

Xala is a 1975 Senegalese satirical comedy film directed by Ousmane Sembene, adapted from his own 1973 novel of the same name; the title is a Wolof word for temporary sexual impotence. It follows El Hadji, a wealthy Senegalese businessman who becomes impotent on the night of his wedding to his third wife, a condition that, by the film's own logic, can only be lifted if he stands naked before the poorest people in his society and lets them spit on him, a premise Sembene uses to attack the failures of the post-independence African business and political class he saw El Hadji as representing. The film premiered at the Moscow International Film Festival in 1975 and won the Special Jury Prize at the Karlovy Vary festival in 1976, and it holds a 91 percent approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes; in 2010 Empire magazine ranked it among the 100 best films of world cinema.