DOCUMENTARY FEATURES
NEW RELEASE
The Battle for Johannesburg
2010
72 min/52 min HD
Director: Rehad Desai & Darryl Els
Producers: Uhuru Productions
Writer: Rehad Desai
The Battle for Johannesburg captures the changing face of a city that’s preparing to host the 2010 FIFA World Cup. It’s a tale of property developers vying for sections of the crumbling city with renewed excitement, of a city council determined to create a world class city and ultimately of how this affects the hundreds of thousands of people who have made the city slums their home. There is money to be spent, even more to be made and conflicting interests are at stake. As whole areas around stadiums get a brush up and the middle classes, black and white, begin to move back in, beneath the scramble for property and space is a human story of survival. The eyes of the world are on South Africa. The film raises universal questions such as does urban development have to mean gentrification and is it possible to create a world class city for all?
NEW RELEASE
Citizen X
2010
60 min HD
Director: Arya Lalloo
Producer: Rehad Desai
Writer: Arya Lalloo
With the Support of Strategies and Tactic
A Project of the Atlantic Philanthropies
Communities across South Africa are up in arms. Tired of waiting for the state to make good on liberation’s promises and facing deepening poverty they have once again taken to the streets. Protest actions have increased in number and volatility since the early 2000’s, reaching record highs in 2010.
CITIZEN X is an unflinching portrait of civil unrest in the New South Africa; recently crowned the most unequal society in the world.
Through the experiences of community leaders in Alexandra, Soweto and Khutsong, the film critically traces the potential beginnings of a popular resistance and asks some difficult questions of both the movements and the state they are up against. Are these protests demanding the dream of equality for all be kept on the agenda… and if not why not?
Bhambatha
2007
60 min DV
Director: Rehad Desai
Producers: Rehad Desai
Writer: Anita Khanna
SABC, Department of Arts and Culture
In 1906, to raise revenue, the Natal Colony, introduces a new tax on the head of every man over the age of 18. Young chief Bhambatha, leads a brave fight against the tax that not only unites many Africans but for the first time sees guerilla tactics used against the enemy on the continent. This film explores the conditions that gave Bhambatha and his supporters no option but to make a stand, and the brutal response by the colony to wrest power away from African chiefs.
Bushman’s Secret
2006
52/82 min DV
Director: Rehad Desai
Producers: Rehad Desai, Anita Khanna, Zivia Desai Keiper, Hartmut Keiper
Writer: Rehad Desai & Anita Khanna
YLE, TV2 Denmark, SBS Australia, Ikon, Holland, ZDF-Arte, RBTF, Belgium, SABC2, NFVF South Africa, EED Germany
Southern Africa’s plant and animal life has a global significance second only to the Amazon Rainforest. Locked within the region is a vast medicine cabinet of untapped resources. This has not gone unnoticed by the pharmaceutical giants whose bio-prospecting has led them into conflict with Southern Africa’s indigenous people, the San. We tell the story of the rabid hunt for new drugs, the vast profits to be made and the marginalized traditional healers of the region in their last stand to heal the world before it destroys them and their practices forever.
Palmares Film Festival 2007 – Best Documentary
Zanzibar International Film Festival 2007 – Best Documentary
Durban International Film Festival 2007 – Special Mention
Taking Back the Waves
2005
52 min/75 min DV
Director: Nic Hofmeyer
Producers: Rehad Desai
Writer:Nic Hofmeyer
Uhuru Productions SABC 2, National Geographic
Surfing and apartheid in the present and the past, told through a black South African big wave surfer and his family.
Born into Struggle
2004
75 min/52 min DV
Director: Rehad Desai
Producers: Rehad Desai
Writer: Anita Khanna & Rehad Desai
Uhuru Productions , YLE 2, SBS Australia, TV2 Denmark, NRK Norway, RBTF Belgium, SABC1, BBC3, Jan Vrijman Fund, Africalia, NFVF, European Union CWCI, Fond Image Afrique, Mott Foundation.
A personal documentary about the filmmaker’s relationship to his well known father, a leader in the South African liberation movement, set against the backdrop of the struggle for South Africa and the transition to democracy.
Encounters Documentary Film Festival 2004 – Best South African Documentary Audience Award
Apollo Film Festival 2004 – Winner
World Cinema Festival Cape Town 2004 – Winner
Cannes Film Festival 2005 - Official Selection
Durban International Film Festival 2005 – Special Mention