Mary Twala Movies
A child tries to hold her family together against prejudice, disease, and ignorance in this drama from South Africa. Chanda (Khomotso Manyaka) is only 12 years old, but she's already been forced to take on many of the responsibilities of an adult in her household. Chanda's father is gone, her stepfather, Jonah (Aubrey Poolo), is an irresponsible alcoholic, and her mother, Lillian (Lerato Mvelase), has been physically and emotionally devastated by AIDS and the death of her youngest child. Despite Chanda's dire circumstances, most of her neighbors offer little sympathy, believing her mother's illness is the result of divine judgment against her, and her reputation isn't helped by the fact that one of her few loyal friends is Esther (Keaobaka Makanyane), a sharp-tongued prostitute. Mrs. Tafa (Harriet Manamela), an elderly member of the village, believes she can help Chandra by moving her mother out of the community, but the girl knows she needs her mother no matter how ill she may be, and sets out to find her and bring her back home. Adapted from a novel by Allan Stratton, Life, Above All was an official selection at the 2010 Cannes Film Festival. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi
- Starring:
- Khomotso Manyaka, Keaobaka Makanyane, (more)
From director David Hickson comes this drama about a young African's cross-country journey. Set in KwaZulu Natal, South Africa, Beat the Drum stars Junior Singo as Musa, a boy who has been orphaned by a plague that swept through his village. Now living with his elderly grandmother, Musa decides to seek out his uncle in Johannesburg, taking along only a drum given to him by his father. The trip proves to be enlightening for young Musa, who is faced with the culture shock of urban society. Also starring Clive Scott and Owen Sejake, Beat the Drum premiered at the 2003 Mill Valley Film Festival. ~ Matthew Tobey, Rovi
- Starring:
- Junior Singo, Owen Sejake, (more)
- 1997
A coproduction of Canada's CBC and the South African Broadcasting network, the weekly 60-minute drama series Ekhaya: A Family Chronicle was set in 1989. Eric Miyeni starred as Darryl, an expatriate South African writer living in Toronto with his Canadian wife Rosa (Julie Stewart). Obsessing over the possibility that he is still being stalked by the South African secret police, Darryl recalled the tragedies and deprivations experienced by himself and his family under the oppressive Apartheid system. Ultimately, Darryl became a firebrand political activist, determined to return to South Africa to right old wrongs, even though it may cost him his life. The first of the series' 13 episodes was shown by the CBC on January 23, 1997. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
- 1995
This African drama presents a political allegory about apartheid. It begins as a South African grandmother tells a story about how animals and humans once competed for control of the Earth. The film then moves into the story of young Nandi and her family who live under the repressive rule of the wicked whites. Nandi loses her family one tragic night when her father and brother are shot for walking on an Anglos-only beach. She in turn kills a cop and is forced to run for her life. She flees to the Ivory coast where she learns about the joys of life after apartheid. There she also meets Solofa who wants to marry her; she says yes, but only on the condition that he go with her on a humanitarian mission to her oppressed home village. Later, Nandi grows more concerned with her own needs and decides to abandon Solofa and leave along with a young Taureg girl whom Nandi uses as her "daughter." ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi
- 1993
- NR
Friendship, politics, violence, and personal responsibility meet head on in this drama. In the late 1980s, three young women who are completing their college education share a house together in Johannesburg, South Africa. Aninka (Michele Burgers) is the daughter of wealthy Afrikaners; she is studying archeology and has personally rejected her family's pro-apartheid politics. Thoko (Dambisa Kente) is Black and receiving a degree in education; her family has little money, and her mother works as a cleaning woman to help pay her daughter's tuition. Sophie (Kerry Fox), whose British parents are well-to-do, is studying library science, and unknown to the others, she has taken a very strong position against South Africa's policy of minority rule. Sophie has joined a terrorist group determined to fight apartheid by any means necessary; under orders from the group, she places a bomb at a busy airport in Johannesburg, killing many innocent bystanders in the process. Sophie's confusion and guilt over the consequences of her actions drive a wedge between herself and her husband, a fellow activist, and it complicates her friendship with Aninka and Thoko. Writer-director Elaine Proctor won the Golden Camera award at the 1993 Cannes Film Festival for her work on Friends. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi
- Starring:
- Kerry Fox, Dambisa Kente, (more)
Whoopi Goldberg stars in this musical take on the South African struggles against Apartheid in the mid-1970s, during the imprisonment of Nelson Mandela. An adaptation of Mbongeni Ngema's popular musical, which ran on Broadway from 1988 to 1989, Sarafina! recounts the political coming of age of the title character, a high school girl involved in the Soweto student protests of 1976. At first just a petulant bundle of energy, more interested in boys than civil rights, Sarafina (Leleti Khumalo) learns of the Afrikaaner oppression through the underground lectures of her teacher, Mary Masembuko (Goldberg). Sarafina's mother, who works as a servant in a white household and never sees her children, urges Sarafina to toe the line. But she can no longer turn a blind eye when the government imprisons her teacher and slaughters her would-be boyfriend during an arson protest. Incited to rebellion, the students kill a crooked black constable, leaving Sarafina to wrestle with their decision to use violence against the government's strictures. Ever tightening its grip, the ruling regime would kill 575 blacks over eight months in an attempt to quell the civil unrest. The sober subject matter is leavened by Ngema's jubilant songs and Michael Peters' electric choreography. ~ Derek Armstrong, Rovi
- Starring:
- Leleti Khumalo, Whoopi Goldberg, (more)
