Tsotsi

I really enjoyed this movie. The setting is harsh, the opening is violent and the violence returns at times through the film. But the message is of the redemptive power of love for children and the way that reproduction, even by proxy, is a civilising force. What's really remarkable, though of a piece with Fugard's hard-nosed stage work, is that this is all done without sentimentality and without a conventional happy ending.

The acting is outstanding in particular from Presley Chweneyagae and Nambitha Mpumlwana. The music is a revelation -- I've just bought the soundtrack from iTunes and am listening to it as I write this.

The political message that I derived from the film (though it doesn't preach) concerns the extraordinary patience of the inhabitants of Soweto. It's 16 years or so since change started happening in South Africa, but so few problems seem to have been solved. One doesn't have to apportion blame for this to wonder how long it can go on without serious problems arising.