Cancel anytime 2191 Movies. A new one everyday
Watch anywhere
In 2009, the body of a young European woman named Alice is found washed ashore alongside those of a dozen black migrants. Eight years later, Swiss filmmaker Pierre-Alain Meier travels to Senegal to understand the story behind this tragic shipwreck. Retracing his own past connections to Dakar, Meier reflects on the complex, asymmetrical ties between Europe and French-speaking Africa.
OFFICIAL SELECTIONS
Visions du Réel
Race, memory and migration between Europe and Senegal
Farewell to Africa is a 2017 Swiss documentary that weaves together a real-life tragedy, a filmmaker's personal history, and an unflinching look at the enduring inequalities between Europe and the African continent.
In 2009, the body of Alice B., a white, 30-year-old European woman, is found washed ashore on an African beach alongside the corpses of a dozen black migrants. The group had attempted the perilous Atlantic crossing from Senegal toward Europe. Eight years after this tragedy, Pierre-Alain Meier returns to Senegal to piece together what drove Alice onto that boat and what her fate reveals about the relationship between two worlds.
As a young man, Meier had walked the streets of Dakar while producing another film. He too was a white European in Africa, and the parallels between his own story and Alice's prove impossible to ignore. Following in her footsteps, he reflects with humility and affection on the complex, asymmetrical ties that have long connected Europe and French-speaking Africa.
Pierre-Alain Meier is a Swiss filmmaker and producer whose career has been shaped by a long engagement with Africa. His personal connection to Senegal, rooted in earlier productions in Dakar, gives the film an intimate, self-reflective quality that sets it apart from conventional migration documentaries. Meier places his own story alongside Alice's, resisting easy answers and allowing the material to speak with quiet moral weight.
The film is set primarily in Senegal, with Dakar at its centre. The city serves both as the point of departure for the migrants' fatal journey and as a place of personal memory for the director. The Atlantic coastline, the streets of Dakar, and the communities left behind by those who perished give the film its vivid, grounded sense of place.
The film received an official selection at Visions du Réel, the prestigious Swiss documentary festival held annually in Nyon. Selection at Visions du Réel places a documentary among the most significant auteur-driven non-fiction films of its year in Europe.
Farewell to Africa is available to stream on GuideDoc, a dedicated documentary streaming platform. You can watch it online directly through GuideDoc's catalogue alongside other films exploring African culture, society, and the human dimensions of migration.
If this film resonates with you, GuideDoc's collection includes several other documentaries that explore Africa, migration, and social change. Leaving Africa and Tanzania Transit examine movement and displacement across the continent, while Magic Radio and Gangbé! offer portraits of African culture and community life.
2191 films
And a new one every day
The preferred platform
of true documentary lovers
Half of all revenue goes
directly to the filmmakers
