How to Build a Library was the first film that opened the Nairobi Film Festival, and in my review, I talked about how much I enjoyed it, especially specific segments where the archived colonial period photographs came out. As much as I enjoyed the show overall, those were some of the most memorable moments of that documentary.
A few weeks later, still at the same festival, I got to see another documentary, and funny enough, what I loved about How to Build a Library was turned up to 11 here. The film I’m talking about is Memories of Love Returned.
Memories of Love Returned is a 2024 documentary made in Uganda and the US by director, writer, actor, and narrator Ntare Guma Mbaho Mwine. Executive producers include Steven Soderbergh and others. The story begins on April 24, 2002, when Ntare’s car breaks down in the small Ugandan town of Mbirizi.
While waiting for repairs, he wanders into a photo studio owned by Kibaate Aloysius Ssalongo, a local photographer whose work spanned from the late 1950s until his death in 2006.
That chance encounter becomes a 22-year journey of documenting Kibaate’s massive archive, staging a public exhibition in his hometown, and reconnecting photographed subjects with their long-lost images.
It’s fascinating how this film turns something as ordinary as a photo studio in rural Uganda into a time machine, a window into memories, love, and time.
Yes, it’s a documentary about the power of photography, but it’s really about the human stories that live inside those photographs. The film takes one of the most universal parts of our lives, time, and makes something very special out of it.
Friendship
From the very first 10 minutes, I knew what I was in for. Memories of Love Returned is the kind of documentary that could only be made by a creative person, someone who sees beauty in everyday obscure things.
This is a story about friendship, about two men brought together by a shared curiosity and love for photography. It’s about an unlikely bond formed in the most random way, a broken car leading to a lifelong creative connection.
Kibaate’s story could have easily remained unknown, buried in the countryside of Uganda, but through Ntare’s eyes, it becomes a love letter to photography and to the forgotten artists who quietly shape the visual memory of a small town.
I loved how the documentary explores their relationship, how Ntare takes what Kibaate created and builds something larger around it. He transforms these still images into an experience for the people who once stood in front of Kibaate’s lens. Watching those same people rediscover their youth through restored photos is haunting and beautiful at the same time.
Photography has a way of reminding us that life is fleeting. It’s all fading, all slipping away, youth, health, even memory. But photographs let us hold on to small pockets of time.
The film makes you sit with that idea, that bittersweet truth that nothing lasts forever, and that maybe that’s what makes it all worth remembering.
Authenticity
What makes Memories of Love Returned so authentic is how it refuses to sensationalise or dramatise what it captures. Everything feels real, and raw, very funny at times. I mean Kibaate was a very colourful character.
You see it in the old footage and photos, the changing aspect ratios, the grainy images and locations that transport you back decades. There’s no filter between you and the story. The editing style feels intentional but never showy. It just lets the story breathe.
Ntare also allows himself to get personal. He opens up about his family, his struggles, and his creative drive, making you feel the story through his own evolution as both filmmaker and human being.
You see him grow through time, stumble through hardship, and still find joy in creation.
The sound design and music choices are very good. At first, the music feels like your standard African documentary score, what you might expect from an outsider’s idea of African rhythm.
But as the story deepens, the music evolves. It becomes part of the emotional journey, carrying us through different eras. Combined with the sound design, it makes the transitions between past and present seamless and often emotional.
Visually, the documentary is stunning. You move from the sweeping landscapes of Uganda to more grounded, intimate shots of ordinary life. Those wide, open spaces contrast beautifully with the tight, concrete frames when at one moment we cut to the West. I thought it was a clever visual metaphor, freedom versus confinement.
The use of aerial shots and close-ups works beautifully with the theme. The structure also mirrors how memory works , you move through time, sometimes clearly, sometimes suddenly, but always tied down to meaning. One moment you’re in the 1990s, the next you’re watching someone from one of those photos reflect on who they’ve become.
And some scenes, when an old photograph is placed beside its subject decades later, are some of the film’s most powerful moments. Seeing time written on their faces hits differently. It’s emotional, not in a manipulative way, but in a deeply human one.
Gripes
Now, while I loved most of it, there were things that didn’t sit as well. The documentary sometimes takes on too many themes at once, family, legacy, loss, identity, even politics , and in trying to give space to all of them, it occasionally loses focus.
There’s also a brief section touching on LGBTQ representation in old photographs that feels disconnected from the main thread. Unlike everything else that was given present context, during this section they just show pictures of men and women together in a shot and loosely imply their sexuality with no present context.
These people could have easily been platonic friends. It’s not that the subject isn’t important; it just isn’t integrated smoothly into the central story about Kibaate, his family, and the restoration of his archive. It feels tacked on, an afterthought, like something that has to be there to align with a narrative or get funding. You could cut out that section and it would have zero implication on the story.
I also thought the small bits on politics were unnecessary considering the strength of what they already had.
There are also lingering questions that the documentary doesn’t quite answer. What happened to the studio? What about Kibaate’s family? The ending, while beautiful and very creative, feels more like a pause than a finish line.
I also thought more time should have been dedicated to the image restoration process for photography enthusiast.
Conclusion
Still, none of that takes away from how deeply moving the experience is. Memories of Love Returned is a film about time, friendship, and creative purpose. It’s about how a simple act, a photograph, can echo through decades, bringing joy to people in the most unexpected ways. It’s haunting in its truth but joyful in its rediscovery.
Through Ntare’s creative vision and Kibaate’s timeless work, this documentary becomes a heartfelt celebration of memory and art. It’s raw, sincere, and full of heart. If you ever come across it, take the time to watch. It’s one of those films that quietly stays with you.
