Friends (1993)

Three female friends, in the end of the eighties, share a house in Johannesburg, South Africa. Each of them has her own way to live the apartheid. Thoko is a black teacher, she practices ... See full summary »

Director:

Elaine Proctor

Writer:

Elaine Proctor

Stars:

Kerry Fox, Dambisa Kente, Michele Burgers

2 wins & 1 nomination.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Kerry Fox	...	Sophie
Dambisa Kente	...	Thoko
Michele Burgers	...	Aninka
Marius Weyers	...	Johan
Tertius Meintjes	...	Jeremy
Dolly Rathebe	...	Innocentia
Wilma Stockenström	...	Iris
Carel Trichardt	...	Rheinhart
Anne Curteis	...	Sophie's mother
Ralph Draper	...	Sophie's father
Mary Twala	...	Grace
Maphiki Mabohi	...	Daphne
Job Kubatsi	...	Maurondile
Vanessa Cooke	...	Prison's warden
Jerry Mofokeng	...	Thomi

Storyline

Three female friends, in the end of the eighties, share a house in Johannesburg, South Africa. Each of them has her own way to live the apartheid. Thoko is a black teacher, she practices non-violent passive resistance. The afrikaner Aninka takes refuge in archaeology not to see the reality. Sophie is a white militant, putting bombs in public places... Each of them respect the other two's ideas, but one of Sophie's bombs will change everything.

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Plot Keywords:

bomb | teacher | afrikaner | apartheid | johannesburg south africa | 

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Genres:

Drama

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Details

Country:

South Africa UK France

Language:

English

Release Date:

14 January 1994 (UK)

Also Known As:

Eine Freundschaft

Filming Locations:

Johannesburg, Gauteng, South Africa

Company Credits

Production Co:

Chrysalide Film, Friends Production Limited

Technical Specs

Runtime:

105 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

User Reviews

You can't always see things in black or white!

An honest but flawed attempt by young South African director Elaine Proctor to examine the last days of South Africa's Apartheid regime as observed and defined by the friendship of three young women from different ethnic backgrounds. Sophie is the anglo activist, apparently propelled into terrorism against a racist system that callously and indiscriminately brutalizes the Blacks she has grown up with. Aninka is an Afrikaner farm girl, at first dismayed by Sophie's activism but then gradually coming to an understanding of the events unfolding around her and the realization that her life will never be the same as Apartheid stutters to its inevitable and violent end. And Thoko, an educated black women whose friendship with Sophie and Aninka has caused her to lose touch with a sense of her destiny, until the sudden loss of her job and the arrival of her mother reawaken in her what it really means to be a Black woman in White South Africa. To me, her chummy friendship with middleclass white women strains credibility. In fact, the collective friendship of the three women seems unlikely; they are poles apart and I for one would imagine their relationship would have been threatened long before the goings-on around the time of Mandela's release. The plot is a bit muddled and the characters unconvincingly drawn. Kerry Fox, who plays Sophie, is a journeyman actress capable of solid performances, but here her acting is overwrought and it can only be assumed that Proctor is responsible. It's not a good script, lacking sharp dialogue and overflowing with clichéd characters. Naturally, all the Blacks are saintly and most of the Whites are evil or impotent. The most believable character is Aninka's new husband, who sees through Sophie's shallowness pretty quickly and tries to steer his wife's life away from the danger of associating with a loose cannon like Sophie. I must say the character of Sophie is such a neurotic flibbertigibbet that it's almost impossible to believe any Black freedom organization would send her to buy bread let alone carry out a terrorist act. Still, it's a film worth watching and maybe Proctor is a director worth following in the future. 6/10