It is fitting that a book that serves as a history and critique of South Africa's film industry is launched right on the doorstep where a new generation of filmmakers are trained.
The book, Richard Green in South African Film: Forging Creative New Directions, will be launched during an event hosted by the Department of Visual Communication, Faculty of Arts and Design, on 27 September, as part of the TUT Arts Festival.
It is authored by Prof Keyan G. Tomaselli and Richard Green and documents Green's experiences as a producer within the local and international audio-visual industry.
Green was the producer and line producer of many acclaimed feature film projects, such as Taxi to Soweto (1991), Soweto Green (1995), Chikin Biznis (1999), Red Dust (2004), District 9 (2009), Spud (2010) and Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom (2013). He was also instrumental in setting up the M-Net New Directions programme, which launched many black filmmakers' careers in the nineties.
Tomaselli is a Distinguished Professor at the University of Johannesburg. He has worked in the film industry and wrote two critical books on it: The Cinema of Apartheid (1988) and Encountering Modernity (2007) and consulted on both film and cultural policy in South Africa during the transition of the 1990s. He is co-editor of the journals Journal of African Cinemas and Critical Arts.
Prof Tomaselli says the authors’ main thesis is that far too much theory is written by academics and far too little is written by practitioners.
“This is a story of innovative producing that changed South African film.”
"Finally, a book that grabs real filmmakers. As film maker Andrew Worsdale writes, ‘First time I’ve ever read an academic tome and felt – yep – moved, touched, sad, and actually kinda cleansed and inspired’".
For more information about the TUT Arts Festival, click on https://www.tut.ac.za/whats-on/events/event?NID=190.
Tickets at Webtickets (TUT Arts Festival) or at your nearest Pick n Pay.
Prof Keyan G. Tomaselli
Richard Green
The cover of Richard Green in South African Film: Forging Creative New Directions.