As part of SNAPSHOT, the year-long touring programme featuring films exploring Black girlhood, made by Black female filmmakers, T A P E presents MILISUTHANDO, directed, written and narrated by Milisuthando Bongela, in participating cinemas nationwide, including filmmaker ScreenTalks.

Milisuthando Bongela’s youth in South Africa was untouched by the horrors, violence, or even the presence of white occupiers. At least that’s how it seemed.

The Republic of Transkei, an unrecognised Black independent region established by the apartheid regime, created the illusion for Black South Africans that separate could be equal. And paradoxically for Bongela, life in the Transkei proved as idyllic as the propaganda claimed.

The fall of apartheid ushered in a new life, one that included – for the first time – whiteness.

A deeply intimate portrait of past, present and future South Africa, blending poetry, film, and photography into a striking cinematic essay, Milisuthando Bongela explores love, friendship, and belonging in a South Africa stratified by racism – proving that only if we understand its tentacles, can we begin to extricate ourselves from its clutches.

Directed, Written and Narrated by Milisuthando Bongela
Produced by Marion Isaacs, Milisuthando Bongela
Editor and Cinematographer Hankyeol Lee
Co-Producer VISO Producciones – Sonia Barrera Gutiérrez, Viviana Gómez Echeverry
Executive Producers Multitude Films – Jessica Devaney, Anya Ross
Executive Producers Charlotte Cook, Brenda Robinso
English | Xhosa | 128 min | 12a

tapecollective.co.uk