Benda Bilili!
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Metascore
77 out of 100

Generally favorable reviews - based on 11 Critics What's this?

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  • Summary: 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 is four singer/guitarists polio, 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. (National Geographic Cinema Ventures)… Expand

Critic Reviews

Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 10 out of 11
  2. Mixed: 1 out of 11
  3. Negative: 0 out of 11
  1. Entertainment Weekly
    Reviewed by: Lisa Schwarzbaum
    Oct 1, 2011
    91
    This unsentimental, smartly assembled film is equally attentive to the cacophony of African poverty and the balm of harmony provided by these pied pipers of hope.
  2. Empire
    Reviewed by: Philip Wilding
    Sep 25, 2011
    80
    Wielding inspiration and uplift in equal measure, this musical odyssey is one of the cinematic journeys of the year. Don't miss it.
  3. The Hollywood Reporter
    Reviewed by: Duane Byrge
    Sep 25, 2011
    80
    Most magically, if one were to listen to their music but not know anything about their heart-wrenching situation, their compositions sound as if they've come from the luckiest and happiest performers in the world.
  4. Time Out New York
    Reviewed by: David Fear
    Sep 27, 2011
    40
    It may be petty to dismiss such a rags-to-much-better-rags story, but given how manipulatively constructed this music doc is, even in its rawest moments, you still leave feeling like you've been played.

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