Tsotsi

Tsotsi took out last year’s best foreign film Oscar and it was well deserved. Gavin Hood has created a profound tale of redemption out of the dusty shanties of Soweto. Tsotsi, very ably played by Presley Chweneyagae is a little thug (literally the meaning of his name) who sets out, with his small band, to steal something each day. He has no compunction about killing in cold blood to achieve his ends. He displays such disregard for human life that it turns the stomach of at least one of his band of thieves who confronts him and ends up taking a brutal beating for his trouble. Tsotsi’s path to redemption begins when he inadvertently kidnaps a baby in the back of a car he steals. He keeps the child, comes to care for it and it becomes the catalyst for changing him, if not into a good man, at least into a less bad one.

Another well played performance is delivered by Terry Pheto as the young mother whom Tsotsi forces to feed and help care for the baby. I was surprised to learn that the Athol Fugard book on which this movie is based is over thirty years old. Of course, the story has been updated to fit the new South Africa, but still, it’s a bit depressing that things have changed so little. I found some of the outdoor scenes very evocative of the places where I grew up. I could almost smell the wood smoke on the air as Tsotsi sits on a rise in the early morning looking out over the Joburg skyline.