By: debbie lynn elias
Form the second time in as many years, South Africa has a film in contention for Oscar in the Best Foreign Film category. This year’s submission is “Tsotsi” which opens this week across the United States.
Soweto, just outside of Johannesburg, South Africa is the equivalent – if not worse – of what American history depicted as shantytowns in the post-civil war South. Home to gangs which survive by raping, plundering and pillaging residents in the nearby city, Tsotsi revolves around the activities of one gang, and in particular, its leader, a 19 year old known only as Tsotsi which in translation means “thug.” Abandoned and orphaned as a young child, Tsotsi was forced to grow up on the violence laden streets of Soweto. With no parental guidance and the only influences to guide him being the amoral subculture of the streets, Tsotsi knows no other life and no other way to survive.
Content to survive by larcenous means, Tsotsi and his followers intend no physical harm to their victims but if same should happen, so be it. Tears will not be shed. That is until their criminal activities escalate and turn into murder. Scared and shaken by the violent turn of events, Tsotsi flees Soweto and his gang brethren, eventually finding himself in an affluent suburb. Hardened to his criminal ways, Tsotsi finds an easy mark with a carjacking. Shooting the woman in the stomach, Tsotsi steals the car only to find a baby in the back seat. On leaving the scene, Tsotsi wrecks the car and with no place go, heads back to Soweto with baby in tow.
Facing an entirely new set of problems, Tsotsi sees this infant almost as a chance of redemption. But caring for an infant is not easy, especially when you have no money, no food and are on the run from the law. In sheer desperation, Tsotsi even stalks a young woman named Miriam, following her to her home and while holding her at gunpoint, forces her to breast feed this helpless infant. This one act turns into the only semblance of family life that Tsotsi has ever known. The emotion that overtakes him with this determination to give this unknown child the life that he himself never had is empowering and life changing.
Presley Chweneyagae, in his acting debut as Tsotsi, is powerful and dramatic but also has an ease and presence that suits the character well. Nambitha Mpumlwana and Rapulana Seiphemo, as the kidnaped baby’s parents, give the most believable and compelling performances in their brief time on screen. More than notable is Terry Pheto as Miriam. A perfect counterweight of beauty, shyness and even grace to the crude carnivorous survivalist nature of Tsotsi, she is the catalyst that brings out levels of humanity and decency previously unknown.
Based on Athol Fugard’s 1950’s novel “Boesman and Lena”, writer/director Gavin Hood presents a startling and striking look at the violent gang culture of South Africa, and particularly Johannesberg, contrasted with the determination arising from desperation of the title character. Attributing a large part of South Africa’s ruination and the resulting lives of those such as Tsotsi to AIDS, Hood creatively uses flashback to tell the story of Tsotsi’s childhood. Unfortunately, the story fails to really send home the crisis as being attributable to AIDS. Although the message is depicted through billboards and flashbacks, there is nothing that stands out putting AIDS at the forefront of causing the problems such as that faced by Tsotsi. If anything, it is the absence of providing a cognitive reason that sends the message that ignorance and silence in the absence of action as to anything are what causes the decay and ruination we see here.
Thanks to cinematographer Lance Gewer and production designer Emilia Roux, the American audience is given something with which to identify in the form of the Old West. Creating an aura with dirt roads and wooden planked sidewalks, railing and saloons flanking the street, the imagery of a High Noon shoot-out acts as the connective tissue to a world like that of Tsotsi’s that many of us know little if anything about.
Something that I rarely comment on in a film is the sound. But here, it is part of the heart and soul of the story. Sound engineer Shaun Murdoch further exemplifies the synergistic relationship between the story and the technical aspects of the film. Using South African Kwaito music by Zola, the commonplace sounds of everyday life are subtlety replaced with music only to then have them reintroduced as Tsotsi’s road to redemption and decency progress. Nuanced with the lightness of a feather wafting in the breeze, the underlying impact of this work is more than impressive.
Artfully combining and complimenting with each other the story and technical aspects of the film, the results are an unparalleled synergistic relationship, seamlessly interweaving the film’s ever increasing message of hope and redemption.
Presley Chweneyagae: Tsotsi Terry Pheto: Miriam
Written and directed by Gavin Hood. A Miramax Films release. Rated R. (94 min)
