Dag Hammarskjöld, the erudite Swedish diplomat and economist who served as the second Secretary-General of the United Nations, was catapulted into global politics during a turbulent period of cold war tensions and decolonisation struggles. Hammarskjöld established the first UN peacekeeping forces during the Congo Crisis, a proxy conflict that forms the basis of Belgian-Dutch-French documentary Soundtrack to a Coup d'État. While Dag Hammarskjöld is indeed a key player in the film, the main focus of this highly compelling work is Patrice Lumumba, the Congolese leader who was assassinated in January 1961 (Hammarskjöld's own premature demise came a mere eight months later).
Curiously, the Swede's suspicious death in a plane crash isn't covered here, perhaps because that knotty subject is worthy of a film of its own. Soundtrack to a Coup d'État—which screens today at the BFI London Film Festival—emerges as a thorough exploration of the complex relationship between jazz music and the political turmoil of the cold war, with particular emphasis on the events surrounding Congo's independence from Belgium. Directed by the Belgian filmmaker Johan Grimonprez (Double Take, Shadow World), the documentary is bookended by the moment when jazz musicians Abbey Lincoln and Max Roach gatecrashed the UN Security Council in order to protest the killing of Lumumba.
Grimonprez's essay film isn't simply a dry retelling of historical events, but rather presents a narrative that splices the genre of jazz with anticolonialism. It portrays how the music became a medium for expressing solidarity with the oppressed; the soundtrack, which features numerous legendary jazzmen and women (Duke Ellington, Nina Simone, Thelonious Monk), encapsulates both the spirit of resistance and the thirst for change. The film also considers the roles of the US, the UN and others during the decolonisation process, noting the vagaries of geopolitics and the fight for control over the mineral-rich Belgian Congo—a country that supplied most of the uranium for the Manhattan Project.
The film includes fine archival footage of US jazz icons, and highlights how some of these artists were used as unwitting decoys as the CIA set about meddling in post-colonial Africa. Perhaps the most infamous of these episodes, detailed here, saw "jazz ambassador" Louis Armstrong visit the African continent, where his performance in Léopoldville provided a smokescreen that allowed for intelligence to be gathered on Lumumba; while Satchmo was still on his tour, the man who had served as the DR Congo's first prime minister was killed by firing squad. Soundtrack to a Coup d'État isn't always entirely successful in its attempts to conflate jazz with politics, but it is immaculately assembled and thoroughly absorbing.
Darren Arnold
Images: Flanders Image
