Pleure ô pays bien-aimé

This is a wonderful movie, based on the famous book. It features excellent camera work, which took full advantage of the beautiful scenery in the South African countryside. It also features an exceptional score by John Barry. In addition, the performances were quite good, although I've heard some people say they thought that James Earl Jones made Rev Kumalo too "soft around the edges". In any case, this is a quite good movie.

Apartheid was a grotesque social experiment aimed at perpetuating the evils of colonialism after the age of empires was past; white liberal Alan Paton one of its most celebrated literary critics. Darrell Roodt's film of perhaps his most famous book, Cry, the Beloved Country', stars Richard Harris and James Earl Jones (better known as the voice of Darth Vader, which leads to some unintentionally comic moments) and is not an awful film; but politically, it misses its targets. Aided by some slushy background music, it invests most of its black characters with a frankly ludicrous level of dignity; while oddly underplaying its depiction of the routine dehumanisation that black people suffered under white rule. In consequence, the film's only real anger appears directed not at the system but at Jones's brother, a nasty and opportunist anti-apartheid campaigner, which was surely not quite the original point. At the end of the film, an impassioned quote from Paton appears on the screen; it's a shame it seems so unconnected with what has preceded it.

Rev Kumalo receives a letter from Johannesburg telling him that his sister, who went there many years ago to look for her husband, is very sick and that he should come immediately. When he arrives he is robbed but finds a home with the sender of the letter. His sister is working as a prostitute in a brothel in town and his quest to help her soon turns to finding his brother and then his own son. However events will bring the nature of the racial divide into full focus.

It has been many years since I read the book but I always remember it as it was quite thought provoking – bringing in wider issues into the framework of the main story. I was surprised to find this version made by Disney and was prepared for almost a child's film, happily I was wrong. The plot is quite well developed in terms of the central story and, although I wasn't moved to the point of tears, I did find it pretty involving and moving to some degree. What it failed to do though was bring out wider issues from the period and setting. True it let us see the places and the divide but there was no subtext – only visual images.

The direction is good – whether it is the outdoors, a rain swept church or a small indoors room, it all has a good sense of place and time. The cast is all pretty good. Jones is the strongest and acts as the moral backbone of the story – he is seeing these things for the first time just like we are as an audience. The late Richard Harris is also good but has less screen time. I think his character needed more as it is he who has the biggest journey of discovery – where Kumalo's is physical, his is more into himself and learning to overcome his feelings. The South African cast are mainly very good and give good support – the only real flaw was that I wasn't totally convinced that Kumalo's relatives were really his relatives – only Dutton managed to bring out an emotional history and have a sort of bond with Jones, the rest were a little too distant.

Overall this is a good version of the book albeit with the focus more on the core narrative than other themes. The leads are good and it is an involving story. Not fantastic but a good drama about one man's strength.

It's been a long time since I read the Alan Paton book upon which this film is based. Paton was banned in his own country and officially silenced but the book was universally popular throughout the 1960s.

James Earl Jones once again renders a bravura performance as the African minister whose son has accidentally killed a white man. One can feel his grief and his burden as he tries to straighten the mess out. His son has confessed but others involved have denied knowledge of the offense.

Richard Harris plays an equally difficult role that of Mr Jarvis the white boy's father. One feels his grief and pain especially when he finds to his surprise that his son had disowned "baaskap," the over-lordship of the white race, something accepted as a given by most whites without a second thought just as the white housewife perfunctorily dismissed the black cleric in priestly garb as if he were a pesty door to door salesman.

Will mercy be extended to the preacher's son who accidentally pulled the trigger and cooperated with authorities or will he suffer the ultimate penalty while accomplices go free? Yet for all the misery the movie, surprisingly without excessive preaching, ends on a flicker of hope for the future.

This film brings to life the lives of a black, country priest and a white wealthy landowner in South Africa in the 1940's.

Religion, politics, faith, healing, mercy and justice- all of these themes are present, but not in an overt, overbearing patronising way.

The two men meet due to unfortunate circumstances related to the activity of their respective sons' in the city, though they have lived in the same country area all of their lives.