Themes: Race Relations, Political Unrest, Mothers and Daughters
Main Cast: Barbara Hershey, Jodhi May, Jeroen Krabbé, David Suchet, Paul Freeman
Release Year: 1988
Country: UK
Run Time: 114 minutes
MPAA Rating: PG
Plot
Cinematographer Chris Menges' first directorial effort, A World Apart was inspired by the lives of South African journalist Ruth First and her daughter Shawn Slovo (who wrote the film's screenplay). Barbara Hershey plays the fictional counterpart to Ms. First, Diana Roth, with Jodhi May as her daughter. Told from the daughter's viewpoint, the film shows us that Diana and her husband Jeroen Krabbe are so busy with their anti-Apartheid political activism that they totally shut May out of their lives. In 1963, Hershey is arrested by the South African police, becoming the first white woman to be held under the infamous 90-day-detention act. Left despondent and suicidal by two separate arrests and by constant harassment from the police, Diana still won't include her daughter in her life until the girl presses the issue in a climactic confrontation. Some critics felt that Shawn Slovo was using A World Apart to settle unresolved issues in her own life: Ruth First was killed under suspicious circumstances in 1982, without ever reconciling with her daughter. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Review
We've seen screen children neglected by parents preoccupied by essentially meaningless jobs or the pursuit of selfish aims (see American Beauty). But cinematographer Chris Menges's impressive debut offers a different take on that dynamic: the price the offspring of political activists pay for their parents' professional devotion. Barbara Hershey, excellent at playing single-minded women, is superb as Diana Roth, and 12-year-old Jodhi May, making her film debut, is a marvel as Molly Roth. (At the 1988 Cannes Film Festival, the actresses shared the Best Actress Award with Linda Mvusi, who plays Elsie, the Roth family maid.) This is mostly a mother-daughter story-Gus (Jeroen Krabbe) the father is not around enough to make an impression--and Diana is sensitive enough to sense the turbulence in her daughter's life. Shawn Slovo's autobiographical script is sympathetic to Molly's dilemma without turning her into a martyr; Molly is just mature enough to understand that the anti-Apartheid cause needs committed people like her parents, but she is after all, a budding adolescent, with all the self-imposed angst that comes with that territory. ~ Tom Wiener, All Movie Guide
Tim Roth - Harold; Linda Mvusi - Elsie; Yvonne Bryceland - Bertha; Albee Lesotho - Solomon; Nadine Chalmers - Yvonne Abelson; Carolyn Clayton-Cragg - Miriam Roth; Merav Gruer - Jude Roth; Rosalie Crutchley - Mrs. Harris; Kate Fitzpatrick - June Abelson; Mackay Tickey - Milius; Andrew Whaley - Interrogating Officer; Adrian Dunbar - Le Rouzx; Jude Akuwidike - Priest; Margaret Hogan - History Teacher; Jo-Anne Huckle - Debbie; Jack Buckell Band; Esma Levend - Whitworth; Lovemore Majaivana and the Zulu Band; Theresa Memela - Peggy; Messias Choir; Cont Mhlanga - Mtutuzeli Nzekwu; Henry Mlauzi; Clement Muchachi - Sipho; Phyllis Naidoo - Saeeda; Maria Pilar - Spanish Dance Teacher; Andre Proctor - Arresting Officer; Toby Salaman - Gerald Abelson; Stephen Williams - Arresting Officer; Nomaziko Zondo - Thandile; Susie Figgis
Credit
Shawn Slovo - Associate Producer, Susie Figgis - Casting, Nic Ede - Costume Designer, Guy Travers - First Assistant Director, Chris Menges - Director, Nicolas Gaster - Editor, Tim Bevan - Executive Producer, Graham Bradstreet - Executive Producer, Hans Zimmer - Composer (Music Score), Dave Appell - Songwriter, Gimbel - Songwriter, Jean-Loup Hubert - Songwriter, Hubert Ithier - Songwriter, Karl Mann - Songwriter, Marquina-Narro - Songwriter, Marquina-Tallada - Songwriter, Antonio Molina - Songwriter, Moraes - Songwriter, Anna Ruiz - Songwriter, E.M. Sontonga - Songwriter, Elaine Carew - Makeup, Maureen Stevenson - Makeup, Brian Morris - Production Designer, Michael Phillips - Production Designer, Peter Biziou - Cinematographer, Tim Bevan - Producer, Sarah Radclyffe - Producer, Graham Bradstreet - Producer, Judy Freeman - Sound/Sound Designer, Shawn Slovo - Screenwriter, Antonio Carlos Jobim - Featured Music
Set in Johannesburg in 1963, the film examines the abrupt ending of 13-year-old Molly's blithe childhood when her father, a communist and anti-Apartheid-activist, must go into exile and her mother must continue her fight against Apartheid without her husband. Molly is avoided by her white ex-schoolfriends and so she seeks greater closeness to her mother. Due to the attempts at intimidation of the military police and the imprisonment of Molly's mother, the relationship of mother and daughter faces a severe test. The "world apart" of the title refers both to the gap between the woman and the teenage girl - who doesn't understand why her mother is so obsessed by events beyond the comfortable world of the white suburbs - and the space between that world and that of the (black) majority. Essentially, the film is a tribute to Ruth First by her daughter and ends in a moment of epiphany as Molly comes to terms with her mother's political activism and understands that she too must play a part in the struggle to change South Africa.
