Yesterday was the pre-premiere of Fally Ipupa’s first movie with a Belgian and Congolese production team, Rumba Royale.

It had the potential to be a high budget epic movie of the golden era of the Congo but was more of a long drawn out, slow, cringey murder thriller (but really a comedy) and sometimes painful to watch, made for Fally fans.

Sadly, I think he should stick to singing!

Some scenes and acting sequences were not very convincing but maybe that wasn’t the goal.

You can see the film tries to be silly at times. I’m sure it was very hard to film in Kinshasa with such a famous star and with difficult authorities.

It was filmed mostly at night at the Academy des Beaux-Arts and in a “bar”.

The cast was good but a lot of them spoke Lingala but with a very French accent making the scenes not really authentic.

If you can, please go see it and support it but don’t expect mind blowing Hollywood quality scenes.

Thank you to the organising team for a fun evening that brought us all together to celebrate Rumba music (the music was great!)!

It’s nice to see that Congolese movies are being made and appreciated ! I just hope that the quality can improve!

(This is my view only! Feel free to disagree!)

If you want to see a bigger production budget movie made in Congo, see Viva Riva (2011) or if want an older movie try to watch La Vie Est Belle (1987) with Papa Wemba.

La Vie est Belle Full Movie :

Trailer Viva Riva :