Drawn from elements of West African folk tales,[4] it depicts how a newborn boy, Kirikou, saves his village from the evil witch Karaba.

After Kirikou's mother tells him that an evil sorceress, Karaba, has dried up their spring and eaten all the men of the village except for one, he decides to accompany the last warrior, his uncle, to visit her and try to stop her.

With the help of his mother and various animals, Kirikou then evades Karaba's watchmen and travels into a forbidden mountain to ask his wise old grandfather about the sorceress.

The drummers turn out to be the sorceress's watchmen and henchmen restored to their original human forms, the missing men of the village, whom she hadn't eaten after all.

[8] The original French voice acting was performed by a cast of West African actors and schoolchildren and recorded in Dakar.