Pieter-Dirk Uys is a South African performer, author, satirist, and social activist. One of his best known roles is as Evita Bezuidenhout, an Afrikaner socialite.
Drum is a 2004 film based on the life of South African investigative journalist Henry Nxumalo, who worked for Drum magazine, called "the first black lifestyle magazine in Africa". It was director Zola Maseko's first film and deals with the issues of apartheid and the forced removal of residents from Sophiatown. The film was originally to be a six-part television series called Sophiatown Short Stories, but Maseko could not get the funding. The lead roles of Henry Nxumalo and Drum main photographer Jürgen Schadeberg were played by American actors Taye Diggs and Gabriel Mann, while most of the rest of the cast were South African actors.
"Sarie Marais" is a traditional South African folk song, created possibly during the First Anglo-Boer War or the Second Anglo-Boer War. The tune was possibly taken from a song dating back from the American Civil War called "Carry me back to Tennessee" or "Sweet Ellie Rhee" with the words roughly translated into Afrikaans.
Promised Land is a 2002 film based on the 1978 English translation of the award-winning Afrikaans novel, Na die Geliefde Land (1972) by the South African author, Karel Schoeman.
Many people of European heritage in South Africa are descended from Huguenots. Most of these originally settled in the Cape Colony, but were absorbed into the Afrikaner and Afrikaans-speaking population, because they had religious similarities to the Dutch colonists.
Killarney Film Studios was a South African film studio established in Johannesburg by New York native and business tycoon Isidore W. Schlesinger in 1915 and is regarded as "the first motion picture studio in Africa". Schlesinger moved to South Africa in 1894, against his family's wishes, when he read about the discovery of gold in Witwatersrand. In 1913, having accumulated wealth throughout various ventures, he ventured in to the entertainment industry in 1913 when he purchased the Empire Theatre in Johannesburg for £60,000 and converted what was an "insolvent" business into a flourishing one named African Consolidated Theatres, which worked on the national distribution of content like variety shows and films from the Cape of Good Hope to the Zambezi River.
Zola Maseko is a Swazi film director and screenwriter. He is noted for his documentary films related to xenophobia.
The Power of One is a 1992 drama film directed and edited by John G. Avildsen, loosely based on Bryce Courtenay's 1989 novel of the same title. The film stars Stephen Dorff, John Gielgud, Morgan Freeman, Armin Mueller-Stahl, and Daniel Craig in his feature film debut.
Jans Rautenbach was a South African screenwriter, film producer and director. His 1968 film Die Kandidaat proved controversial and received some censorship in South Africa, because of perceived criticism of the apartheid system. His last film, Abraham, was a hit at the South African box office.
Katrina is a 1969 South African drama film directed by Jans Rautenbach and starring Katinka Heyns, Jill Kirkland and Don Leonard. Based on a play called Try for White by Basil Warner, the film depicts the lives of a family of a Coloured South Africans, who in the apartheid system are considered neither white nor black, in which Katrina, the daughter, attempts to appear white, before her secret is exposed. The screenplay was written by Emil Nofal.
Boerehaat is an Afrikaans word that means "ethnic hatred of Boers" or Afrikaners as they became known after the Second Boer War. The related term Boerehater has been used to describe a person who hates, prejudices or criticises Boers or Afrikaners.
Boetie Gaan Border Toe is a 1984 satire film set during the South African Border War. The film was directed by Regardt van den Bergh, and stars Arnold Vosloo, Frank Dankert and Frank Opperman. Production was assisted by the South African Defence Force (SADF).
Elmo De Witt was a South African filmmaker, who worked as a director and a producer. His films include Debbie (1965), The Last Lion (1972), Ter Wille van Christene (1975), Grensbasis 13 (1979) and You Must Be Joking! (1986). He was a prolific filmmaker, whose activity spanned more than three decades, from 1959 to 1992. Keyan Tomaselli considers him typical of Afrikaans directors who "have made films which conflict with the stereotypical "farm" image of the Afrikaner".
Katinka Heyns is a South African actress, director and filmmaker in the South African film industry. She is known for including feminist perspectives in her films, as well as for commenting on South African politics and culture. Her work includes the film Paljas which was selected as the South African entry, but eventually not nominated for Best Foreign Language Film at the 70th Academy Awards.
Thelma Gutsche was a South African filmmaker, film historian, writer, and arts patron, referred to as "South Africa's most accomplished early cinema historian" by a later film scholar.
Thomas William Saymoir Meyer was a South African film producer.
Forever Young, Forever Free is a 1975 South African drama film directed by Ashley Lazarus and starring José Ferrer and Karen Valentine. The lives of actors Muntu Ndebele and Norman Knox are dramatised in the 2011 unofficial sequel Canadian film, A Million Colours, directed by Peter Bishai and co-written with Andre Pieterse.
The Life and Times of Sarah Baartman is a 1998 South African documentary film directed by Zola Maseko.
Lydia Lindeque, born Rachel Alida du Toit, was a South African actor of Afrikaner descent. Initially known by the stage name Alida du Toit, she started touring at the age of seventeen with Paul de Groot's acting company. Soon adopting the name Lydia Lindeque, she worked with many stars of the era over the following decades, including Taubie Kushlick in 1958. She first performed in English in 1943, in William Shakespeare's Twelfth Night, and, in 1945, travelled to Egypt and Italy to direct stage plays for the South African Army troops stationed there. She was married to the playwright Uys Krige in 1937, later separating and marrying John Mantel. After retiring in 1976, she died in Andorra in 1997.
Symbol of Sacrifice is a 1918 film dramatisation of the 1879 Anglo-Zulu War. It follows English soldier Preston Fanshall from the British defeat at the Battle of Isandlwana to Rorke's Drift where he participates in the successful defence of that post. His love interest, Marie Moxter, is captured by the Zulu during the battle and taken to their capital at Ulundi. Moxter's black servant, Goba, travels to Ulundi and intervenes to protect her from the advances of German villain Carl Schneider who has allied with the Zulu. The film shows the British defeat at the Battle of Hlobane and the arrival of reinforcements, including Napoléon, the French Prince Imperial. The prince becomes a central character for a portion of the film and is shown, in a lavish flashback, meeting Queen Victoria and Empress Eugénie at Windsor Castle. The death of the prince at the hands of the Zulu is shown. A second love triangle involving a Zulu woman, Melissa, with a warrior, Tambookie, and a villainous witchdoctor, is also depicted. The film ends with the British victory at the Battle of Ulundi, ending the war. Goba and Tambookie help Moxter to escape, but Goba is killed in the process and Tambookie enters Moxter's employment.
