Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2005. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
Sunday Times (Johannesburg) - November 27, 2005
YESTERDAY
Stars: Leleti Khumalo, Kenneth Kambule, Lihle Mvelase
Director: Darrell James Roodt
Certificate: PG
Running Time: 96 mins
There is a shot in Roodt's film, which was nominated for a foreign-language Oscar, that sums up this country in a matter of seconds.
In the background is the great and beautiful amphitheatre of the Drakensberg, in the foreground a black peasant woman, her back to the camera.
She is Yesterday (Khumalo), and she might as well be facing a firing squad, for she is the wife of a miner (Kambule) who has infected her with HIV.
The point of the shot is that we don't see her face. She could be any one of millions of peasant women. The only thing she has left in this world is her daughter, Beauty (Mvelase).
Like any loving parent, Yesterday will do anything to make sure that her Beauty gets the best possible schooling. That is as far as Yesterday's future can go.
Shot and scored in an achingly simple style, Yesterday might resort to melodrama every now and again, but this fine film is never depressing.
Maybe that's because its anger is directed clearly at the politicians who dither over the living corpses of their people.
SPECIAL FEATURES
A director's commentary and an interesting Behind-the-Scenes documentary.
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