BENDA BILILI! follows an unlikely group of musicians in Kinshasa, capital of the war-torn Democratic Republic of Congo. The band, Staff Benda Bilili—in English, “look beyond”—is a group of street musicians composed of four paraplegics and three able bodied men. The core of the group is four singer/guitarists, who use customized tricycles to get around: Ricky, the eldest and a co-founding member of the band; Coco, the band’s composer and co-founding member with Ricky; Junana, the member most disabled by polio, yet the official choreographer; and Coude, a bass player and soprano singer. Joining them is a young and entirely acoustic rhythm section, led by Roger, a teenage prodigy on the satongé, a one-string guitar he designed and built himself out of a tin can.

• 1 hr 26 min
• Directed by

  Florent De La Tullaye

  ,

  Renaud Barret
• Written by Renaud Barret, Florent De La Tullaye

• Starring

  ,

  Léon Ricky Likabu

  ,

  Roger Landu

  ,

  Coco Ngambali Yakala

  ,

  Kibin Kabeya

  ,

  Paulin 'Cavalier' Kiara Maigi