As a South African film buff I am glad to see that a South African director has finally decided to make a film that deviates from the usual South African fare of either didactic political diatribes or awful slapstick comedies. Ken Kaplan has crafted a surprisingly inventive little film that combines elements of vampire lore, black comedy and political allegory. This may sound a strange mix but it's at least a departure from routine generic films. The film has its failings (the characters aren't fleshed out enough, a weak romance and a predictable ending) but I admire the film because it is both unique and uniquely South African. It took Kaplan around 13 years to finally finance and complete Pure Blood but the tragedy is that, despite it's entertainment value and the fact that it is actually about something, this film will probably never be released. This is due to the reluctance of local distributors to distribute South African films and the fact that it is non-genre, i.e. not easy to categorize. Needless to say the South African film industry needs a major restructuring to ensure that a film such as this can be seen by the public rather than those terrible candid camera films regularly foisted onto South African screens.
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