FILM&VIDEO
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Rent and Stream
You can access the videos on this page on Vimeo. Just follow the links associated with each film.
01
WE ARE ZAMA ZAMA
In the ruins of the world’s deepest gold mines, desperate migrants scavenge for the remainders of fortune. Following the lives of three miners, as they make their perilous journeys in the airless tunnels below ground and in the labyrinth of informality above ground, We are Zama Zama is the culmination of four years of collaborative filmmaking: an immersive, emotionally gripping story of risk and survival.
Official selection: ENCOUNTERS International Documentary Film Festival (Johannesburg, world premiere 2021), New York African Diaspora International Film Festival (selected for 'Best of the Fest'), Annual Copenhagen Film Festival (Finalist, Best Feature Documentary), Oslo Film Festival (Winner, Best Editor), South African Film Festival (Canada/USA; Australia/New Zealand); Taiwan International Documentary Festival.
Available in theatrical (74 mins) and television broadcast formats (52 mins). Visit the film's dedicated website here.
Or go directly to VIMEO to rent.
02
A FILM IS BEING MADE
Filmed entirely underground by the informal miners who call themselves the 'zama zamas' (gamblers), A Film is Being Made chronicles the journey to find gold as well as a cinematic language in which to tell the story of this desperate journey in the ruins of the world's deepest gold mins. The film is both the background and the supplement to We are Zama Zama.
This film is part of 'The Zama Zama Project,' and premiered at the Berlinale Forum Expanded, as an official selection (2021). 18mins.
Available for licensing via Arsenal-Berlin.
03
DREAMING DEMOCRACY
Part of 'The Zama Zama Project,' dedicated to an exploration of the lives lived in the shadow of deindustrialization amid the world's deepest gold mines in South Africa, Dreaming Democracy is an extended conversation about poverty and political possibility.
Dreaming Democracy was part of the official selection at the Berlinale Forum Expanded, as an official selection (2021). 12mins.
Available for licensing via Arsenal-Berlin.
04
THRESHOLDS OF THE VISIBLE WORLD
Alternating between the realms of the divine and the deep underground, encompassing the rituals of obeisance to the ancestors and the sermons of walking evangelicals, Thresholds of the Visible World is a sensuous evocation of transgression and transcendence.
Part of the official selection at the Berlinale Forum Expanded, as an official selection (2021). 8:40 mins
Available for licensing via Arsenal-Berlin. May be paired with Surfacing.
05
WOMEN UNDOCUMENTED &
AN EDUCATION
Many women living on the margins of deindustrializing spaces receive the left-overs of the left-overs. In this paired set of films, a woman testifies frankly and in conversation with her husband, of the work they perform, the fears that they endure and their hopes for their children's future enabled by education.
Part of the official selection at the Berlinale Forum Expanded, as an official selection (2021). 6:36mins and 11:43mins respectively.
Available for licensing via Arsenal-Berlin.
06
NO ACCIDENT
It is no accident that the poorest among Africa's populations are exposed to accident as part of the everyday experience of attempting to survive. In this poignant testimonial, an informal miner describes what it is like to be wounded underground--to such an extent that he no longer knows whether the leg in front of him is his own or not.
Part of the official selection at the Berlinale Forum Expanded, as an official selection (2021). 5:46 mins.
Available for licensing via Arsenal-Berlin.
07
SURFACING
A gritty, sensuous exploration of the phenomenon of manual rock crushing as part of the informal mining process. In this unspeakably arduous labor, earth and air are intermingled, making the lung an archive of dust.
Part of the official selection at the Berlinale Forum Expanded, as an official selection (2021). 7:17 mins.
May be paired with Thresholds of the Visible World. Available for licensing via Arsenal-Berlin.