SA one to watch at Sundance festival
● It’s been a long, hard slog of crowdfunding and glass ceilings, but Durban-born director Zamo Mkhwanazi has finally made it to one of the world’s top film festivals.
Mkhwanazi is SA’s first black female director to present a narrative film at Sundance, which is currently running in Utah in the US. Sadla, screening in the World Narrative Shorts competition, had its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2019.
Mkhwanazi told the Sunday Times this week about the challenges she has faced. “We hear so much about government agencies supposedly supporting black women in film. Every year we hear about initiatives to get black women to make feature films. Yet over the years we’ve seen little results in our cinemas, and even when a film has been made, the woman filmmaker has not received the full funding and has to go unpaid for years of work,” she said.
Friends in the industry embarked on an extensive crowdfunding campaign to help fund Mkhwanazi’s trip to Sundance. “Someone who passionately believes in Sadla paid my Sundance entry fee as I couldn’t afford it,” she said. “Without the kindness of my crowdfund contributors, my cast and crew, their devotion and hard work, I would not have been able to make the trip.”
Sadla, set in Brixton, Johannesburg, is a study of shifting power balances and police brutality. The short film stars Kuthula Magubane, Sipho Nxumalo and actress Abena Ayivor.
South African filmmakers, producers and directors have a strong presence this year at Sundance, the largest independent film festival in the US. The 10-day festival, which kicked off this week, launched the careers of directors such as Ava DuVernay and Quentin Tarantino.
Sundance has been a proponent of virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality in its New Frontier selection and cutting-edge Biodigital Theatre. Among this year’s films is Azibuye: The Occupation by South African documentary filmmaker Dylan Valley. It is SA’s first VR/360° documentary to make its world premiere at Sundance.
It follows two artists/activists, Masello Motana and Evan Abrahamse, as they occupy an abandoned mansion in an affluent Joburg neighbourhood.
“Because the camera shot in 360 degrees, that meant that every angle was always in shot,” said Valley, attending Sundance for the first time. “It was quite a challenge getting used to filming and having to hide behind a tree or cling to a rock while shooting, as the house was on a steep mountain ridge.”
One of the most anticipated films in the World Cinema Dramatic competition at Sundance this year is This Is Not A Burial, It’s A Resurrection, directed by Lemohang Jeremiah Mosese.
It received acclaim at the Venice International Film Festival, and tickets for the film’s world premiere at Sundance and five subsequent screenings sold out well in advance.
The film’s producers, Cait Pansegrouw and Elias Ribeiro, have returned to Sundance after their last attendance with Inxeba (The Wound) three years ago.
“The film was inspired by Mosese’s grandmother and his own personal experience with eviction and forced resettlement in Lesotho,” said Pansegrouw.
South African filmmakers Dereck and Beverly Joubert have attended Sundance in the past, but this year will be their first attendance with an official entry in competition, Okavango: River of Dreams.
Sundance founder and famed leading man Robert Redford took an interest in the couple after watching their conservation film, Soul of the Elephant, at Sundance. The film inspired US talk-show host Ellen DeGeneres to interview them in 2016.
While filming Okavango: River of Dreams in Botswana in 2017, the couple almost died after a run-in with a charging buffalo.
Also among the South African offerings at Sundance is Influence, a documentary on the rise and fall of notorious London-based public relations firm Bell Pottinger, and its racially divisive PR campaign designed to benefit the Gupta family and former president Jacob Zuma. It is directed by Joburg-based political journalists Richard Poplak and Diana Neille.
The winning short films will be announced on Wednesday, followed by the feature award winners on Saturday.
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