Jerusalema

"If you're going to steal...Steal big, and hope like hell you get away with it!"

Lucky Kunene grows up in the slums of Soweto but dreams about a BMW, a house with a view of the ocean and a well-educated, smart and beautiful woman at his side. But he has a large family to take care of and a rejection of a university grant leads him elegantly on to the wrong track. The employer of the two pals Lucky and Zake is Nasareth, the local gangster. When big money roll in and the cut of his suit becomes more Italian, the future indisputably looks bright. But happiness of course does not last long in this business. The salvation is Hillbrow, on the outskirts of Johannesburg. And a somewhat surprising new project, impressive in its ingeniousness.

Several critics have pointed out references to films like City of God and Scarface in Ralph Ziman’s Jerusalema – with its exploration of the dream to quit the slum for a better life in the city. Here are familiar genre devices, with good production values and hit-and-run scenes providing tension and authority. The action genre is perhaps generally known for its somewhat flat characterisations, but in Lucky Ziman does not only attempt to present a portrait of an unscrupulous criminal. The backdrop is the old white government, apartheid and the miserable circumstances the black have lived under. Lucky’s Soweto project makes him the white policeman’s enemy no. 1. He does not want to enrich only himself, but has also a credible concern for the awful living quarters in the satellite town of Hillbrow.