Popular From Namibia

An intimate portrait of beloved drag artist Alfredo April’s life and legacy, told through the voices of his mother, friends, and Cape Town’s queer community in the wake of his tragic murder in Malmesbury.

Brasse Vannie Kaap is a captivating and moving documentary film about the iconic South African hip-hop group Brasse Vannie Kaap (BVK) who exploded onto the music scene during the pivotal early years of the new South Africa.

In Liminale, a film with Hanneke Schutte as screenwriter and director, Inge Beckmann portrays Mia, a depressed woman afflicted by distressing memories. Hoping to deal with her trauma, Mia is subjected to radical futuristic therapy in an institution set in the future. But while she experiences the surrealist liminal space during therapy, she discovers the surprising origins of the treatment and must gather energy to face her demons and seek forgiveness.

After a dramatic evening, Jana (Kotze) and Chris (Wilhelm van der Walt) face a new day, each occupied by their own thoughts. Something serious and unspoken hangs in the air between them. As they follow their morning routine, the events of the previous night are gradually revealed. Emma and Philip developed the story and concept together, and Philip wrote the screenplay. He also directed the film with its intimate exploration of how life proceeds unabatedly, despite tragedy, pain and joy. They answered some questions about the film.

A little boy’s tears bring a tiny man, made of modelling clay, to life in Paul Crafford’s short film, Die boodskapper, this year in the Shotgun Shorts category of the Silwerskerm Festival. Single frame animation is combined with traditional filmmaking in this 12-minute movie that tells the story of a young boy, Jake (Liam Kruger), who finds himself caught in the middle of a ferocious conflict between his parents, Susan (Izaan du Toit) and Frank (Emile Hager).

Deuntjie examines that little voice residing in every person’s head. In the case of Deuntjie (Anja Taljaard), a shy, conscientious girl, the voice has a name: Vera (Daneel van der Walt), a larger-than-life diva, accompanied by two flamboyant backing vocals, Moses and Jacob. They perform and cause commotion in poor Deuntjie’s head. When Deuntjie has trouble to distinguish between reality and the voices in her head, matters get out of hand.

In O, Griet! Sy’s droog, the actors Char Carrie from Suidooster fame, Karin van der Laag, Letolo Sekano and Ronel Stander draw viewers into a new dimension. In this short film, the characters find themselves captives in framed paintings, each depicting a different version of society’s ideas on women. To escape from the confines of the frames seem impossible … Until a girl with a pearl earring arrives with new perspectives on their situation.

In Marie se laaste dag, written by Lourensa in collaboration with author and theatre maker Mercy Kannemeyer, we meet Marie (Mandri Sutherland), the trusted secretary of the Minister of Mineral Resources, Hendrik van der Merwe (Deon Lotz). On the first day of the newly formed government of national unity (GNU), Marie is tasked to arrange a meeting for her boss with newly appointed Defence Minister, Mayihlome Khumalo (Dumisani Mbebe). Marie is ready to embrace the ideals of the New South Africa, with a helping hand from Thandi (Rozanne McKenzie), Minister Khumalo’s secretary who wears hot-red lipstick.

The psychological thriller Die skynwerper has a sterling cast that includes veterans like Dawid Minnaar and Antoinette Kellermann, as well as the Donkerbos and Dinge van ’n kind actor Ben Albertyn in the lead role. The story, written by Linsen Loots and Dewet van Rooyen, with Van Rooyen as the director, focuses on Nelis (Albertyn) who lives in seclusion with his paralysed father, portrayed by Minnaar. When Nelis loses his job, he considers participating in a reality series Die skynwerper, but when his audition fails, he becomes suspicious of the series’ presenter, whom he believes is manipulating his life from the shadows …

South African Movie

Surrounded by vast expanses of desert and sea, the small Namibian harbor of Walvis Bay is the unlikely setting in which filmmaker Cecil Moller explores the lives of sex-workers. Dependent for their business on the brief visits of foreign shipping trawlers to this remote port, the women give revealing insights into the choices they have made and why they have made them. Their conflicts to do with notions of love, sex, sin and redemption become the main themes, while the threat of HIV/AIDS hangs ominously in the background.

A colony of water worshipers can forfeit their only chance at the fulfillment of a long-awaited prophecy. Vera, the chosen woman, must decide whether she will follow her heart and betray the colony and whether she will stay to become Evander's third wife and live a life without love.

The Namibian desert town Oranjemund was until recently run by the Namdeb Diamond Corporation. Only employees were allowed to live there and Namdeb provided housing, free water and electricity. Now that Namdeb is about to close its mines and leave town altogether, the people of Oranjemund are left with uncertainty. Many are planning to depart.

A short film about a young woman that discovers intimacy, and the loss thereof, through an intricate relationship with her best friend and the dissipation of her parents' marriage.

A film about dirt, gender and separations.

Kommandokorps in South Africa organizes camps during school holidays for young white Afrikaner teenagers, teaching them self-defence and how to combat a perceived black enemy. The group’s leader, self-proclaimed ‘Colonel’ Franz Jooste, served with the South African Defence Force under the old apartheid regime and eschews the vision of a multicultural nation. In nine days, boys who once carried a budding belief in South Africa's unity become toughened men with racist ideas.

PG du Plessis’ story is set in rural South Africa during the seventies. A farmer buys a broken little cast iron stove to restore and transports it home in his truck. Along the way he picks up a schoolboy hitchhiking home for the weekend. In conversation the farmer learns from the boy how cast iron should be welded. Only after dropping the boy off, does the farmer realise how much he has really learned from him.