BERLIN -- To mark the 10th anniversary of the end of apartheid, the Berlinale has this year put the spotlight on films from South Africa. The highest-profile picture about the country and its troubled past is British director John Boorman's competition title, "Country of My Skull", which was battered by critics for the perceived clumsiness of its approach. For more of an inside take on contemporary South Africa, the Forum sidebar has been screening a series of films under the banner "Project 10: Real Stories From a Free South Africa," which has been drawing large crowds to the films' premieres here. The series was developed and commissioned by the country's top pubcaster, SABC 1, with backing from the National Film and Video Foundation and the Amsterdam-based Maurits Binger Film Institute. One of the principles behind the project is to allow filmmakers to find their individual ways of telling individual stories, instead of reverting to the collective "we" that had come to characterize narratives in South Africa as the country groped for democracy and unity. "We were in the background -- the filmmakers made the films they wanted to," NFVF CEO Eddie Mbalo said. "I think that says something, that they could make films without censorship or control."...
- 2/10/2004
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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