African Arguments

Top Menu

  • About Us
  • Write for us
  • Contact us
  • Advertise
  • Newsletter
  • RSS feed
  • Donate

Main Menu

  • Home
  • Country
    • Central
      • Cameroon
      • Central African Republic
      • Chad
      • Congo-Brazzaville
      • Congo-Kinshasa
      • Equatorial Guinea
      • Gabon
    • East
      • Burundi
      • Comoros
      • Dijbouti
      • Eritrea
      • Ethiopia
      • Kenya
      • Rwanda
      • Seychelles
      • Somalia
      • South Sudan
      • Sudan
      • Tanzania
      • Uganda
      • Red Sea
    • North
      • Algeria
      • Egypt
      • Libya
      • Morocco
      • Tunisia
      • Western Sahara
    • Southern
      • Angola
      • Botswana
      • Lesotho
      • Madagascar
      • Malawi
      • Mauritius
      • Mozambique
      • Namibia
      • South Africa
      • Swaziland
      • Zambia
      • Zimbabwe
    • West
      • Benin
      • Burkina Faso
      • Cape Verde
      • Côte d’Ivoire
      • The Gambia
      • Ghana
      • Guinea
      • Guinea Bissau
      • Liberia
      • Mali
      • Mauritania
      • Niger
      • Nigeria
      • São Tomé and Príncipe
      • Senegal
      • Sierra Leone
      • Togo
  • Politics
    • Elections Map
  • Economy
  • Society
  • Culture
  • #EndSARS
  • Specials
    • Covid-19
    • Travelling While African
    • From the wit-hole countries…
    • Living in Translation
    • Red Sea
    • Beautiful Game
  • Debating Ideas
  • About Us
  • Write for us
  • Contact us
  • Advertise
  • Newsletter
  • RSS feed
  • Donate

logo

African Arguments

  • Home
  • Country
    • Central
      • Cameroon
      • Central African Republic
      • Chad
      • Congo-Brazzaville
      • Congo-Kinshasa
      • Equatorial Guinea
      • Gabon
    • East
      • Burundi
      • Comoros
      • Dijbouti
      • Eritrea
      • Ethiopia
      • Kenya
      • Rwanda
      • Seychelles
      • Somalia
      • South Sudan
      • Sudan
      • Tanzania
      • Uganda
      • Red Sea
    • North
      • Algeria
      • Egypt
      • Libya
      • Morocco
      • Tunisia
      • Western Sahara
    • Southern
      • Angola
      • Botswana
      • Lesotho
      • Madagascar
      • Malawi
      • Mauritius
      • Mozambique
      • Namibia
      • South Africa
      • Swaziland
      • Zambia
      • Zimbabwe
    • West
      • Benin
      • Burkina Faso
      • Cape Verde
      • Côte d’Ivoire
      • The Gambia
      • Ghana
      • Guinea
      • Guinea Bissau
      • Liberia
      • Mali
      • Mauritania
      • Niger
      • Nigeria
      • São Tomé and Príncipe
      • Senegal
      • Sierra Leone
      • Togo
  • Politics
    • Elections Map
  • Economy
  • Society
  • Culture
  • #EndSARS
  • Specials
    • Covid-19
    • Travelling While African
    • From the wit-hole countries…
    • Living in Translation
    • Red Sea
    • Beautiful Game
  • Debating Ideas
Politics

DIARY: at the movies (Of Good Report) – By Magnus Taylor

By African Arguments
November 4, 2013
1322
0
Share:

MagnusTo The Hackney Picturehouse on Friday night for the launch of Film Africa to see Jahmil T.Quebeka’s “˜Of Good Report’ – a subversive, monochrome peep show into the life of a South African killer.

Quebeka’s film is at times sickeningly violent and uncomfortably sexually explicit – a darkly comic exploration of the predatory “˜wolf’ the director sees as lurking within all men.

The film follows Parker – an itinerant teacher with a murky past in the South African army (described in his reference as being “˜of good report’) – who starts working at a rural South African school, living in a tin-roofed shack owned by a distrusting matriarch and her grandson. Parker encounters a seductive young woman (Nolitha) in a local drinking den and starts a passionate relationship with her before discovering that she is one of his students.

This does not put him off continuing his illicit affair. Nolitha becomes pregnant and has an abortion, returning to class 6 months later. She then rejects Parker, which precipitates his decent into paranoia, murderous jealousy and a calculated attempt to dispose of a corpse.

Parker’s crime is eventually discovered by a local police officer, but he manages to escape her clutches and at the finale is seen stumbling to freedom and more opportunities for employment and lupine satisfaction in South Africa’s chaotic neighbour, Zimbabwe.

Whilst themes of misogyny and violence against women are strong, the film is about more than just this – it is definitely no “˜agenda’ piece solely made with the intention of highlighting a particular “˜issue’.

It is, to a greater or lesser degree, a warped love story (in the vein of Nabokov’s Lolitha – openly referenced in the female lead, who suffers a more grisly ending than her almost namesake), a vision of life at the margins of a violent society and an indictment of the South African educational system.

Whilst the local context is strong, the broad narrative could be shifted to South Korea or South London and work almost as well.

That “˜Of Good Report’ received such a positive reception (gauged by my unscientific post-screening straw-poll) is both testament to the seriousness of it as a piece of drama, and a festival audience willing to be open minded about a movie that might not be to all tastes (irrespective of its obvious quality).

Off to the The Ritzy tonight to see Ousmane Sembene’s classic “˜Black Girl’ – “[a] searing account of the isolation of a young black domestic servant working in Antibes, and the first feature to be produced and directed by an African.”

Magnus Taylor is Editor of African Arguments.

Previous Article

Madagascar’s democratic transition still afloat as Robinson ...

Next Article

Kenya and the ICC: “Don’t be vague, ...

mm

African Arguments

Leave a reply Cancel reply

  • NigeriaPoliticsSouth Africa

    “Who is South Africa to humiliate Nigeria?”

  • Politics

    Civil Society and Doha: Where Next?

  • Politics

    Nigeria: As Democracy and Stability Hang in the Balance, What Is the Role of the International Community? – By Johnnie Carson

The Africa Insiders Newsletter

Get the free edition of our exclusive look at this week’s most important developments on the continent.

Please wait...

Thank you for signing up!

  • 77143
    Followers

Interactive Elections Map

Keep up to date with all the African elections.

Most read

  • africa elections 2021

    Africa Elections 2021: All the upcoming votes

  • Africa coronavirus covid A woman in Mali wearing a mask. Credit: Photo: World Bank / Ousmane Traore.

    Africans don’t just live to die. A response to the New York Times.

  • eritrea Adigrat Street in Tigray, Ethiopia. Credit: Rod Waddington.

    Eritrea in the Tigray war: What we know and why it might backfire

  • In Aksum, Tigrayan region of Ethiopia. Credit: Rod Waddington.

    As a Tigrayan, my bond with Ethiopia feels beyond repair

  • The police block opposition presidential candidate Bobi Wine in December 2020 during the Uganda presidential election campaign. Credit: HEBobiwine.

    Uganda: How donors can go beyond “strongly-worded statements”

Brought to you by


Creative Commons

Creative Commons Licence
Articles on African Arguments are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
  • Cookies
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms & Conditions
  • en English
    am Amharicar Arabicny Chichewazh-CN Chinese (Simplified)en Englishfr Frenchde Germanha Hausait Italianpt Portuguesest Sesothosn Shonaes Spanishsw Swahilixh Xhosayo Yorubazu Zulu
© Copyright African Arguments 2020
en English
am Amharicar Arabicny Chichewazh-CN Chinese (Simplified)en Englishfr Frenchde Germanha Hausait Italianpt Portuguesest Sesothosn Shonaes Spanishsw Swahilixh Xhosayo Yorubazu Zulu