The State Against Mandela and the Others
In October 1963, Nelson Mandela and nine other leaders of the banned African National Congress appeared before the Pretoria High Court in the apartheid state of South Africa. This diverse group of fighters against apartheid included members of various African peoples, white Jewish South Africans, and an Indian Muslim, all of whom were accused of sabotage and potentially faced the death penalty. While there are no images of the nine-month trial that followed, the 256 hours of audio recorded include some of Nelson Mandela’s most fiery declarations of faith. After the tapes were restored by the French National audiovisual Institute in 2012, French journalist Nicolas Champeaux and director Gilles Porte decided to use them as the basis for this documentary about the trial that led to sentences of life imprisonment for Mandela and his comrades but proved to be a watershed moment in the national and international resistance to racist segregation. Using dramatic charcoal animation to illustrate the trial tapes and contemporary interviews with survivors and witnesses including Winnie Mandela to comment on the events, Champeaux and Porte have created a galvanizing account of this battle against injustice, with subtle reminders that the fight is not over yet.
DIRECTOR
Nicolas Champeaux
Gilles Porte
SCREENPLAY
Nicolas Champeaux
Gilles Porte
CAST
Winnie Mandela
Ahmed Kathrada
Denis Goldberg
Andrew Mlangeni
Percy Yutar
Quartus de Wet
David Yutar
Max Sisulu
DETAILS
Documentary
English
144 min.
France, South Africa, 2018
DISTRIBUTOR
ARTIFICATION
PRICE RANGE
$300-$500
VIRTUAL SCREENING PLATFORM
Vimeo