Alyssa Banta In Timbuktu, at a Koranic school ... At a time when Europe was emerging from the Middle Ages, African historians were chronicling the rise and fall of Saharan and Sudanese kings ...

In the wake of ISIS's takeover of a Belgium-sized slice of the Middle East, "Timbuktu" has more immediate resonance than either of those films. The movie opens with a pickup truck of fighters ...