No Easy Road

A finalist at the American Film Festival, this disturbing documentary from BBC Television News journalist Michael Buerk recaps the four years he spent covering the news in South Africa before being expelled in 1987. As the on-camera narrator, Buerk sets the scene for a particular "news story," and then shows us the clip--or, in many cases, shows us footage which the BBC refused to air. Describing the day-to-day life of a journalist in South Africa, Buerk says that he was shot at, gassed, beaten, and imprisoned during his sojourn, trying to unravel what was a total ball of confusion. And this seems to be the flavor of the video also, as we jump from story to story without a real sense of focus drawing together the disparate threads. The most interesting segment is on an interracial couple, Bob and Sylvia, who live in a Capetown suburb and attend a town meeting to argue with the councilors over the ridiculousness of a law which allows them to be wed, but not to live together. Another segment offers the ironic spectacle of the theatre in South Africa where whites gather to see plays depicting the true plight of black South Africa. The most disturbing sections come near the end of the film. Commenting on the rampant violence, and how it sickens him, Buerk shows a clip of the savage murder of a black man suspected of killing a leader by a black group. What we saw before we had to look away was a group of men running down and then butchering another man with axes and knives. And in the clip which brought about Buerk's expulsion, we see white police beating white student protestors. The footage is shown in slow motion with an ominous musical soundtrack. If the filmmakers are so disgusted with violence, why the enhancement with audio-visual doctoring? Nearly four years have passed since Buerk left South Africa making the material somewhat dated, but even more than the age the problem here is that people will see a number of disturbing sights, but they are unlikely to come away with a greater understanding of the situation in South Africa. Not a necessary purchase, and definitely not recommended for any K-12 school libraries due to the extreme violence. (See THE GREENHOUSE EFFECT for availability.)