Department of History

Directed by Martinique born Guy Deslauriers with an English narration adapted from the original French by Walter Mosley, The Middle Passage is a poetic rumination, narrated by Djimon Hounsou, a native of the West African nation of Benin. It was the route between Africa and the New World bringing slaves to exchange for sugar and tobacco. It was the sea that carried human cargo. It was called The Middle Passage. Now the story is told by an African slave whose spirit haunts the ocean route. Sold into slavery by the King of Dahomey, he is shackled and transported on a journey shared with some six hundred souls. A journey barely half would survive. Victims of disease, pestilence, brutal beatings, rape and torture, the slaves dance in defiance, sing in defiance, die in defiance. They journey far from home, leaving their history behind them, forging a new story that resonates to this day. The story of The Middle Passage.