And we’re all locked down
‘United Apart’ exposes grim contradiction in SA society
The realities of millions of South Africans from diverse socioeconomic backgrounds who endured last year’s hard lockdown will be laid bare as Showmax and Arena Holdings showcase a heart-wrenching film about the dire effects of Covid-19.
The hour-long documentary, United Apart SA – Lockdown Remembered, which was funded by Arena Holdings, will be available exclusively on the subscription streaming platform from September 9.
In March last year, with less than a handful of known infections, SA embarked on one of the strictest lockdowns in the world.
United Apart SA is a deep dive into the country’s official lockdown strategy and the effect it has had on society.
There’s also footage crowdsourced for the Sunday Times #UnitedApartSA campaign, which urged South Africans to show how they were getting through lockdown by submitting video clips, images, voice notes or anything else that captured the essence of this extraordinary event.
“These videos showed us the different ways that people were coping under hard lockdown. Some sang and held performance shows in their homes. But we also saw the grim contradiction because lockdown was harsher to black South Africans than to white people,” said Ochre executive producer Krisen Pather.
“We saw the army patrolling in the township and violent altercations between the people and soldiers. The film probes whether the one-sizefits all approach works in a country like ours with huge gaps between the haves and have-nots and whether the state has the resources to attend to emergencies.”
It took about seven months to shoot the film as they had to navigate the strict environment posed by the lockdown.
The film, directed by Anton Burggraaf, features president and CEO of the SA Medical Research Council Prof Glenda Gray, clinical infectious diseases epidemiologist Prof Salim Abdool Karim, deputy governor of the SA Reserve Bank Rashad Cassid, Business Day editor Lukanyo Mnyanda, Sowetan editor Nwabisa
Makunga and Sunday Times editor S’thembiso Msomi, among others.
“We are delighted to have sold United Apart to Showmax,” said Debbie McCrum, MD for television and entertainment at Arena Holdings.
“It’s an informative, moving and entertaining investigation of what we went through as a nation during an extremely challenging year. With its focus on local content, Showmax is making the documentary available to South Africans in the comfort of their own home.”
How much did our lives change? Did the authorities go too far? Can a developing economy follow the lockdown models for fiscally sound countries? What fault lines did Covid-19 expose? What more could have been done to effect change while fighting a devastating pandemic?
These are the questions pondered in the film.
‘‘ It’s a moving, entertaining investigation of what we went through...