I saw the film Life, Above All a couple of weeks ago. The film recently won the South African Film and Television Award for Best Picture. It is a visceral and at times gut-wrenching depiction of a young girl faced with the burdens of a family who is falling apart. The film is notable for its use of non-professional actors, as well as for being entirely in Sepedi (the language most of my students in Mamelodi speak as their first). It is beautifully shot in vivid colors that captures small-town South Africa well.
While at times melodramatic, the film raises some provocative and urgent questions about disease, stigmatization, and community. While gritty and realistic, I think the film should be taken more as a fable; a contemporary, moralistic entry into the category of folk stories. It might send the wrong message to read too literally into the context of the events. But that is for you to decide, not me :)
It is directed and conceived by Oliver Schmitz, a white South African who has made a couple of other well-received South African films (read more about him and the film here). The film was also South Africa's submission to this year's Academy Awards Best Foreign Film category.
Below is the trailer:
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