Don’t Miss Heritage Cape Town

Monique January feels the power of a different beauty pagaent

Beauty no longer has one fixed face and body representing it, it comes in all forms, shapes and sizes. While including various physical appearances may seem like the end goal, real beauty is the deeper ideological meaning associated with beauty. This is the prize.
Miss Heritage Cape Town tells an empowering story of surpassing normative beauty standards and celebrating more voluptuous unconventional woman seen through the lens of 20-year-old Olwaba Nkuzi. (more…)

Women – as the first recourse

Leago Mamabolo meets women helping themselves develop their art

There is great value and importance in documenting yourself- particularly for disenfranchised groups who have historically been left out of the picture. Given this, it is no surprise why Zanele Muholi, a South African woman and internationally renowned visual artist, would lead the inspirational project of a Women’s Mobile Museum (WMM). Muholi describes photographing yourself as “giving yourself a voice”. (more…)

Displaced

Khethiwe Shobede is less than impressed with a documentary on the Holocaust

Displaced is a documentary film directed by Sharon Ryba-Kahn centred around the experience of a third-generation survivor of the Nazi Holocaust and the difficult conversations that still surround the topic. While this exploration of people’s experience of memory and genocide is an interesting and insightful ‘idea’ for a documentary the film itself fails to deliver. It does ask important questions about the effects of the Holocaust three generations after the actual events took place. (more…)

Bellingcat key shifts citizen journalism

Michael Taylor reviews a memorable documentary that questions the truth of headline news challenged by internet investigators

Bellingcat: Truth in a Post Truth World offers a fascinating insight into the world of citizen journalism, telling the story of the individual’s working for the titular Bellingcat investigative news website. Over the course of its 89 minute, Bellingcat goes into detail about the innovative methods that citizens can use to fact check the information that we are presented with on a daily basis. This is all derived from social media, Google Earth and other open source internet data. (more…)

Love conquers all in Blend

Monique January reviews a powerful story of an interracial relationship

South Africa’s historical racial dynamics still loom in the present in interracial relationships like Monique and Leonard’s and remain constant reminders of the past despite the fight to move forward. (more…)

A miss of The Bisho Massacre

Temba Mkosi questions the film’s account of history

This short film directed by Petunia Mokoena is as gripping as most of the political documentaries made about the history of South Africa. The Bisho Massacre: Who Pulled the Trigger? explores the chilling accounts of the 1992 Bisho Massacre involving the African National Congress and the Ciskei Defence Force – a bloody chapter on the road to the first democratic elections of South Africa in 1994. The massacre is one of many events that remain swept under the carpet of South African history much like the 2012 Marikana Massacre involving the SAP. (more…)

What’s in a name – Re Bo Mang?

Leago Mamabolo reviews a student production about naming and destiny.

How do we contextualise where we are from? The film Re Bo Mang? (Who are we?) does this by begging the question of, “what’s in a name?”. Centred around the directors, Karabo Magofe Mahlaela and Dimpho Edwin Mabodimo’s Pedi community, the film reveals that there are contesting opinions and views on the issue of how much impact a name has on one’s life. There are two main characters, Thomonodah Mohlala and Odirile Makola, whose stories the film follows. The film is screened in the South African Student Film category at Encounters 2020. (more…)

Thoughts on Mrs F

Claire O’Reilly reviews the Nigeria of patriarchy and progress portrayed in Mrs F from her lockdown kitchen.

INFLUENCE: Bad bots made bad news

Influence opens the Encounters festival.
Luvo Mnyobe takes a look at fake news and its effects

Young people turning to digital media for news has left traditional newsrooms in disarray. In just months of the pandemic lockdown we have seen legacy titles in daily newspapers and magazines disappear. The end of these titles is not just a loss for the journalists who worked for them but presents a threat to our already fragile democracy. (more…)

Celebrate Our Youth – Meet The Flame Crew

Production by Catherine White

In celebration of Youth Day 2020, we get to know a local dance group from Humansdorp, The Flame Crew. Dancing has kept them off the street and away from drugs. They are an example to the youth in their community who look up to them. We find out how they started and what they aim to do.

A Jeffreys Bay male takes a stand against Gender Based Violence GBV

Production by Catherine White

Rudy-Junior Goliath (20) of Jeffreys Bay woke up on the morning of the 16th of June 2020 and decided to take a stand against gender-based violence GBV, not realising that it was Youth Day. We speak to a protected source, who talks of her GBV experience within marriage.

The Lockdown Music Trail – Jeffreys Bay

Production by Catherine White

Some Jeffreys Bay residents found a way to work around the constraints of the South African Covid-19 lockdown to bring live music back to the community.

RUTV4

Get to Know Our preCovid Quirks.

Production by Clair O’Reilly & Leago Mamabolo

Dark Glow – David Glover (music video)

Production by Leago Mamabolo and Claire O’Reilly

David Glover, a White South African man, takes us on a sinister and sultry trip of what it means to carry white male privilege. In a country where nightfall is a thief to many, David explores how ‘bread’ (money) and power affords him an all access pass to the night.

Addicted To You – Duane Walters (music video)

Duane Walters is a South African musician based in Nelson Mandela Bay. He grew up in Makhanda, formerly known as Grahamstown. His song “Addicted To You” is a South African pop song for the year 2020. Duane celebrates his love for his fiancé in Makhanda, the town that shaped who he is today, both as an artist and performer. He dedicates this song to her.

Production by Catherine White & Michael Taylor

Distance (music video)

Distance is a song about a woman (m.o.a.n.m) finally realizing that she deserves better than what her partner (Yonela) is putting her through. She lets go of her false hopes and seeshim for who and what he really is.

Production by Ongezwa Shosha & Khethiwe Shobede