Soundtrack to a Coup d’Etat

Director: Johan Grimonprez

Jazz and decolonisation are entwined in this historical rollercoaster that rewrites the Cold War episode that led musicians Abbey Lincoln and Max Roach to crash the UN Security Council in protest against the murder of Congolese leader Patrice Lumumba.
It is in 1960, six months after the admission of sixteen newly independent African countries to the UN, that a political earthquake shifts the majority vote from the colonial powers to the Global South. As Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev bangs his shoe in indignation at the UN’s complicity in the overthrow of Lumumba, the US State Department swings into action by sending jazz ambassador Louis Armstrong to Congo to deflect attention from the CIA-backed coup, featuring excerpts from ‘My Country, Africa’ by Andrée Blouin (narrated by Marie Daulne aka Zap Mama), ‘Congo Inc. ’ by In Koli Jean Bofane, ‘To Katanga and Back’ by Conor Cruise O’Brien (narrated by Patrick Cruise O’Brien), and audio memoirs by Nikita Khrushchev.

Awards: Sundance International Film Festival: Special Award
Oscar nomination 2025: Best full-length documentary