/ 19 June 2008

Unarmed propaganda

<b>NOT QUITE THE MOVIE OF THE WEEK:</b> <i>Son of Man</i> is the story of Jesus retold in an African country.

I didn’t see U-Carmen eKhayelitsha when it showed on our big screens, but I caught it on TV. In fact, when it appeared before me on the mini-screen I at first didn’t know what it was, having missed the credits, but the opening shot alone pulled me in — the camera jinking through township streets at about the level of a stray dog’s eye. And the story kept me gripped; the transposition of Bizet’s opera from Spain (the exotic ”other” of France, obviously, in those days) to a South African township actually made more sense of the plot dealing with love and death than the original opera did.

On that basis, I had high hopes for the next production from the Dimpho di Kopane company group and director Mark Dornford-May. The concept sounded intriguing: the story of Jesus retold in an African country. I thought that might give some new life to the ”greatest story ever told”, emphasising the social-justice aspects of it rather than the ideas of divinity, faith and salvation that have been so beaten to death by reborn Christianity.

And, yes, that’s mostly how Son of Man treats its narrative, though it is perhaps ultimately rather torn between Christ as a secularised social redeemer and Christ as a divine figure sent by God from an otherworldly realm to save humanity from itself. This is liberation theology versus the Christ who insisted his kingdom was not of this world.

Jesus (Andile Kosi) is born in Judaea, an African country that, as the film opens, is occupied by a neighbouring land’s armed forces who seem to be propping up local strongman Herod. Jesus narrowly escapes murder at the hands of that strongman and/or the devil who apparently inspires Herod. Jesus and his parents flee to safety, having been warned of the impending massacre of the innocents by an angel. So far so biblical.

Jesus grows up to become an inspiring social activist, one who offers his followers a version of Gandhian satyagraha as a form of passive resistance to oppression. He rejects his disciples’ offers of firearms in the pursuit of armed struggle (or perhaps it was simply armed propaganda). Nonetheless, he falls foul of the authorities — Again, so far so biblical — apart from the social-justice angle, which isn’t always apparent in the gospels, this is pretty much the narrative as we know it from Matthew, Mark, Luke, John and Pier Paolo Pasolini.

But, of course, there’s a twist. The relocation to the dust of an African township gives the story a new context, obviously, and frames the portrait of Christ as social activist with a fresh contemporary resonance. This is a powerful new, ahem, location in which to retell the tale: there is much relevance to Africa today, even to the world in general. As backdrop, all that works fine, but I wasn’t entirely clear what Jesus’s message was. I could see that the oppressors were bad, and resistance was obviously necessary, so perhaps that’s taken for granted, but precisely which issues were at stake here I’m not sure. Was it just a matter of getting rid of the occupying armies? (Cross-reference to Iraq, here, anyone?) A matter of sovereignty? Democracy? Opposition to oppression in general?

Perhaps I missed it, or I’ve forgotten something in the months since we were shown the film. (Its release here was delayed for a long time.) I was also rather confused by the occupying-army idea, which set me thinking about South Africa invading Zimbabwe to restore order and overthrow the regime there, an idea that is mooted occasionally in this country, versus the Iraq debacle. At any rate, the uniformed and bemedalled buffoon giving the official state line on TV (very Zimbabwe!) handily sums up a continent’s worth of official spokespeople putting a bland spin on bloody repression.

Such inspired ideas pepper Son of Man and the traditional songs reworked for the occasion give it a fair amount of energy and life. The actors deliver their roles with conviction, too (especially Pauline Malefane as Mary; she has an enormous screen presence, as U-Carmen eKhayelitsha first demonstrated). But overall I found the movie slipping from my mental grasp. It’s as though the reliance on retelling a familiar story, and finding ways to create meaningful correspondences between that gospel and a present-day reality, has taken the place of developing character through an organic relation with the plot. What if the Jesus story doesn’t evoke in one the traditional religious sentimentality but a sense of déjà vu?

I’m not sure, either, that matters are satisfactorily resolved or integrated when it comes to the supernatural elements (angels as feathered boys, Satan as a glowering gangster type in a leather jacket) versus the all-too-tangible real-life picture of African poverty and oppression. The former aspect tilts the film towards ”magic realism”, perhaps (if not flat-out religious mumbojumbo) and is all too reminiscent of the bald female devil who pops up at odd moments in Mel Gibson’s horror movie, The Passion of the Christ — though it must be said he is better-looking and more convincing as a devil figure. Maybe Son of Man needed to go further in that direction, to flesh out the mythic aspects of the story more fully and give it that legendary resonance. Or would that have detracted from the gritty feel of contemporary Africa? Was there a way to develop both aspects and pull them together? I don’t know, and I suspect the filmmakers don’t either.