2012 Sundance Predictions: Mads Brügger’s The Ambassador

#03. The Ambasador – Mads Brügger

Winner of the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance back in 2010 for The Red Chapel, Mads Brügger pointed his GPS towards Central African Republic – where according to the filmmaker, poses as “the Man with the Yellow Hat gone bad” – the Curious George character but in the diamond trading mode. The Ambassador receives it world premiere by opening the IDFA later this month and it would logically make sense for him to continue the festival circuit showings by landing in Park City 8 weeks later with a slot opening in the World Cinema Documentary Competition.

Gist: A strange, enigmatic and decadent white diplomat arrives in central Africa, looking like a mixture of Henry Stanley and Karl Lagerfeld. He has recently bought an ambassadorship and claims to be a do-good rich business man, who has come to spearhead a diplomatic mission. Officially he is there to start a factory that produces matches – this, to employ locals and teach how to make this simple piece of fire-making equipment. Unofficially he is really there to gain access to vast reserves of diamonds. The Ambassador is a genre-breaking, tragic comedy about the bizarre world of African diplomacy.

Producer: Peter Engel
(IONCINEMA.com Preview Page // IMDB Link)