For his first feature-length fiction film, Sissoko focuses on children, like many filmmakers before him who seek to address with delicacy a society's injustices (de Sica, Kiarostami, Ghobadi).  A young brother and sister try to balance school and their menial jobs in order to be able to continue their education and so that their impoverished family can make ends meet. The film exquisitely balances the grinding poverty of the world of these children with moments of play and affection as they interact with friends and family. Like all of Sissoko's subsequent work, Nyamanton has its didactic moments, but the rest is given over to observing the lives of these children with simple directness and with moments of comedy and grace.