The Bang Bang Club is a must see for photographers
The South African film The Bang Bang Club reenacts the struggle and complexity of the anti-Apartheid era through the stories of four photojournalist in the 1990s. Based on true events and a book written by two of the surviving photographers, The Bang Bang Club released this week in the very same country that was once torn between politics, race and nationalism. Set in Johannesburg and its surrounding townships after the release of Nelson Mandela’s 27 years incarceration between 1990 and 1994. The films shows the confusion and internal fighting between ANC (African National Congress) supporters and the dominate Zulu controlled Inkatha Freedom Party, each using violence against each other during the time that Mandela and South Africa’s former President F.W. De Klerk were negotiating the end of a white minority rule.
The film opens with a group of photographers for The Star newspaper witnessing a fatal confrontation in a township and from there the movie takes you inside the lives of two pulitzer prize winners and a friendship that was bonded by danger and documenting a turbulent past. Greg Marinovich (Ryan Phillipe), Ken Oosterbroek (Frank Rautenbach), Kevin Carter (Taylor Kitsch) and Joao Silva (Neels van Jaarsveld) are on the front lines dodging bullets, camouflaging police attacks and risking their lives to show the intensity of the conflicts that was showcased across foreign newspapers.
Robin Comley (Malin Akerman) is the photo editor who battles to decide which pictures to publish due to its graphic nature while the ruling National Party governs behind a iron curtain to hide its mistreatment of its black majority citizens from the rest of the world. A guest appearance from Alf Khumalo, a world renown black photographer for his pictures of Muhammad Ali, Winnie Mandela and Robert Kennedy provides the audience the pressure that black journalist faced covering the riots between Zulu and Xhosa ethic groups. As white photographers the four members were able to maneuver in crossfire’s and photograph the people and the communities effected by the war. The name “The Bang Bang Club” originated from a South African magazine article that was changed from “The Bang Bang Paparazzi” because the members felt the word paparazzi misrepresented their line of work.
The film dives head first in the intensity of what it feels like to be in a war without being a solider. Instead of shooting bullets, The Bang Bang Club sometimes freezes the frame to simulate shooting a picture. Directed by South African filmmaker Steven Silver, it captures the time period accurately and the emotional fear of the people living in the townships at the time. Taking you on a thrilling roller coaster, each scene shows how traumatic it was for the photographers personally and the people fighting for a liberated South Africa. Even when Kevin Carter won a Pulitzer for Featured Photography for his infamous photograph of a vulture appearing to stalk a starving child in southern Sudan, he was not able to cope with the media’s attention which eventually lead him to commit suicide just weeks after winning. With films like Cry Freedom and Invictus gaining international acclaim in my opinion The Bang Bang Club is one of the best South African-made films released to date. Like Bob Marley sang “everywhere is war” but only a few can survive to document it.
