Africa Live: The Roll Back Malaria Concert

On March 12-13, 2005, some of Africa's greatest musicians—including Youssou N'Dour, Angélique Kidjo, and Baaba Maal—gathered before more than 50,000 spectators in a football stadium in Dakar, Senegal for a concert to promote awareness of malaria, which is actually the continent's biggest killer, not AIDS. Unfortunately, while director Mick Csaky (using a 32-track recorder and six television cameras) does a solid job of interspersing interview and ambient footage in with the various musical acts, many of the artists here simply aren't driven to the kind of revelatory performances that elevate concert films above the mundane. Worse, the sound quality—despite the Dolby Digital 5.1 and stereo options—is lacking: instead of the big, booming sound one would expect for a concert of this size, most of the music sounds thin, both underperformed and underproduced. There are, of course, exceptions: Corneille's two-song set of breezy, Sade-esque R&B is well received as is the closing set from N'Dour and Kidjo. DVD extras include 10 bonus musical performances and UNICEF's “Roll Back Malaria” short film. Optional. Aud: P. (M. Moore)