A South African Film? Implications of a Transnational Film Theory for Stylistic Analysis in South African Film Studies

1 Is Tsotsi (2005) a South African film? Implications of a Transnational Film theory for stylistic analysis in South African Film Studies. Michael Hatton University of KwaZulu-Natal 2 Disclaimer I declare that this assignment is my own work and that I have correctly acknowledged the work of others. This dissertation is in accordance with University of KwaZulu-Natal and School guidance on good academic conduct (and how to avoid plagiarism and other assessment irregularities). ................................... ....................................... Michael John Hatton Date 3 Abstract The aim of this dissertation is to explore the question: “Is Tsotsi (2005) so Hollywoodised as to be unrecognisably South African?” It is a question that relates to the style of Tsotsi from a perspective of a national paradigm. Using Appadurai’s (1990) global flow theory that shows the flow of money, people, technology, media and ideology across and through borders, this dissertation begins to question the limitations imposed by a national framework. In the first chapter, the history of South African cinema shows that film emerged in a relationship with audiences as a transnational medium from its inception. Themes that emerge are those of hybridisation, indigenisation and a porous Hollywood/World cinema binary. The audience can be seen as active, and as supported by Hall’s (1973) theory of reception, they contest, negotiate or accept dominant encodings. Various readings of Tsotsi are investigated highlighting the contestation that emerges from critical discourses involving race and Third cinema. These discourses themselves are subject to global flows as is Hollywood cinema that shows hybridisation and heterogeneity through the impact of various flows. A textual analysis of Tsotsi using the transnational methodology of directing craft, reveals that the film uses a sophisticated and heterogeneous style that is indigenised in many ways through the mise-en-scène, sound and lighting. Other cinematic codes, such as narrative structure and editing, show conventional approaches that are at times challenged by the breaking of rules. In conclusion, the dissertation finds that films allow for audiences to emotionally engage and transform themselves through “a series of elements (such as character, plots and textual forms) out of which scripts can be formed of imagined lives, their own as well as those of others living in other places” (Appadurai, 1990:299). This provides the final challenge as to whether Tsotsi is a South African film and the final answer can only be that it resides with the audiences of transnational cinema. 4 Acknowledgements I would like thank Dr. Nicola Jones and Professor Anton van der Hoven for all their help and wise words during the writing of this dissertation. I would also like to thank my mother Eve Hatton and my late fiancée Marysia Lawrence for their support and encouragement. 5 Table of Contents Introduction…………………………………………………………………………………..6 Chapter 1 - The Transnational beginnings of film in South Africa........................................11 Chapter 2 - Theoretical Framework and Problems with Current Film Theory……………..38 Chapter 3 - Context and a methodological approach to stylistic analysis…………………..68 Chapter 4 - Textual Analysis of Tsotsi (2005)……………………………………………...78 Chapter 5 - Findings……………………………………………………………………….140 Chapter 6 - Summary and Conclusions……………………………………………………165 Bibliography……………………………………………………………………………….179 Appendix…………………………………………………………………………………..185 6 Introduction In 2006, Tsotsi (2005) won the Best Foreign Film award at the annual Academy Awards. It was an achievement that seemed to signal the coming of age of South African film. No other film from South Africa had won such a prestigious award or received such international acclaim. On returning to South Africa the cast and crew were greeted by many enthusiastic locals. For some it was a yet another reason to celebrate the transition to democracy. For others, however, this was evidence of something more troubling. Apartheid-era South African films have a problematic space within film history, and have been routinely excluded from accounts of African cinema. Since the end of apartheid, South African films have circulated more widely and have attracted much more international interest (although even then, not always without controversy: when Tsotsi won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film in 2006, many in its home country considered the film, which was directed by the white South African Gavin Hood, to be so ‘Hollywoodised’ as to be almost unrecognisably South African) (Ezra, 2007:168). In this context, Ezra (2007) uses Tsotsi as an example that highlights the sometimes divisive and contradictory nature of the National film paradigm. Tsotsi certainly appears to be “South African” on the surface. The director, the cast and the crew are South African citizens. The story is set in South Africa and is written by South African Athol Fugard. The locations, production facilities and much of the equipment are all locally sourced. Even at the level of sound, the kwaito music and the dialogue are unique to South Africa. It is only when looking at the financing of the film that links to other countries become apparent, in this case the United Kingdom. This, however, is not what Ezra is referring to, but rather to the reaction of 7 Tsotsi’s perceived “Hollywoodisation” in terms of the film’s style. Film style may be considered as the way a film is made using the narrative and dramatic subtext as a blueprint to articulate the basic building blocks of film – shot lengths, angles, lenses, staging, performance, lighting, sound and editing. For many filmmakers, educated in film schools, the interpretation of a narrative involves breaking down the screenplay into moments called ‘beats’. The beats as explained by Proferes (2005) in his book Film Directing Fundamentals may serve a purely narrative function, or they may serve a dramatic function whereby various elements of style are used in simultaneous ways to express the sub-textual meaning in the imagery and sound. Adding further complexity to this understanding of style is the way different audience members may respond to it. The aim of this dissertation is to foreground Transnational Film Studies in an effort to understand the style of Tsotsi (2005) not through a National film paradigm, but rather as a local film exhibiting global flows. It is a paradigm that encompasses the context and creative processes involved in working with the medium and that acknowledges the fluidity and disjunctures that may occur. Transnational film theory does not dismiss the value of National film but rather extends it by considering the multiple ways in which people, money, media, ideas and technology flow through the medium of film, and how these flows may impact on and influence the style of a film. What follows is a brief summary of the various chapters. In Chapter 1 the challenge is to understand how developments in South Africa, seen through the lens of Appadurai’s (1990) transnational scapes reveal cinema as being part of a global mediascape and a transnational medium from its inception. To this end the work of Thelma Gutsche (1972) in The History 8 and Social Significance of Motion Pictures in South Africa 1895-1940 (1972) is invaluable. The second major goal of this chapter is to explore the origins of classic Hollywood cinema both in terms of the developments in style but also as a response to audiences using cinema as a means to understand modern life. Here, Tom Gunning’s theory of a ‘Cinema of Attractions” and Miriam Hansen’s theory of ‘Cinema as vernacular modernism’ are used to integrate Appadurai’s transnational scapes within a framework that incorporates the movement of ethnoscapes, technoscapes, mediascapes, ideoscapes and financescapes within a transnational context. The goal is to acknowledge that cinema has always existed beyond the borders of the national. In Chapter 2 the aim is to explore the prevailing contemporary critical theories used to understand films made in South Africa and to consider these theories in the context of global flows. The objective is not to replace National cinema with Transnational film theory but rather to circumscribe it, reaching beyond national borders and the structuring dichotomy of Hollywood versus World Cinema. It is not a utopian theory suggesting equal flows and directions: rather, it reveals many disjunctures. It does, however, allow for considerations, beyond the national, which are based on actual human activity and social agency as described by Appadurai (1996). In keeping with the findings of Chapter 1 that show global audiences, even from the earliest days, drawn to cinema’s technology, its attractions, its ways of helping negotiate modernity and its use as an alternate public sphere, this chapter foregrounds audiences expressing their social agency through dominant, negotiated or oppositional readings of local films, in particular Tsotsi (2006). In addition this chapter explores the current state of the South African film industry and the hybridisation that has occurred in Hollywood films through the impact of transnational flows emanating though shifts in technology for example, and influences from other nations and directors such as Akira 9 Kurosawa. Chapter 3 briefly outlines the production context of Tsotsi, highlighting the transnational dimensions and indigenisation inherent in the making of the film before providing a more detailed approach for the

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