I was promised heaven but meanwhile I’m still on earth and I keep on rowing.

This song over the closing moments of Erige Sehiri’s fourth feature sums up the experience of three sub-Saharan women trying to find a place and purpose in a Tunisia that feels a lot like present day USA. 

We open with a striking Annie Liebowitz-like frame of a child’s face in a bath, surrounded by bubbles. The child, Kenza (Estelle Kenza Dpgbo), is one of many who have been orphaned and turn up undocumented after the boat her family was on, fleeing their country, has overturned. She has found her way to the home of Marie (Aïssa Maïga), a pastor in an underground church, the Church of Perseverance, that brings some comfort to people like her who are not residents and are trying to find a life.

Kenza is a bit of a MacGuffin though, as the story is not really about her. She weaves in and out of the frame, oblivious and only ever in the moment, providing the narrative connection between the three key women of the story. Marie carries the weight of responsibility of her church and has faith that it will all work out. Jolie (Laetitia Ky) is young and a student, resentful of the work she must do in the church and anything that reminds her that perhaps she has no place in this country.

Naney (Debora Lobe Naney) is the most fascinating, she has left a child behind in the Ivory Coast and is trying with every grift and scheme to get enough money to either return to her or to flee to Europe. Caught in a crisis of indecision as to what will benefit her child most. 

What connects them all is the church and the weekly sermons that exhort everyone to persevere, to believe that God has a plan and that everything will be okay. In the background is the Tunisian government’s increasing crackdown on rounding up anyone who looks dark skinned, regardless of their status. They are thrown into jail and mistreated, made to feel they don’t belong, abused and deported – so much like the USA at this moment. 

All three women are at risk of this and face it in different ways. Marie believes because she is doing good work she will be protected. Jolie believes that because she is a student she has special status. Naney is the only one who really understands how precarious her existence is.

The narrative weaves amongst the  women, rarely being dogmatic, offering glimpses into their particular struggles and the moments where their resolve breaks. The role of religion feels like a key element as we see that sometimes it is the only thing giving people hope when things are really hopeless. It feels empty, particularly in a third act scene with Naney giving testimony.

As the film closes and that song plays, it feels like it pulls all the threads together, particularly for Marie. Not only does their religion promise them that God will come, it promises a better life after this one. You can imagine how you may cling to that and just keep on rowing.