: Amandla! A Revolution in Four-Part Harmony
Fascinating documentary exploring the role of music in the downfall of apartheid in South Africa. It goes back through 40 years of revolutionary music, and explains a lot of the sad history of apartheid in the process.
It’s not quite as good as the genius idea: I would have liked more details about the music itself, and more complete versions of the songs. The film shows snippets of people singing, interspersed with interviews freedom fighters and song writers and artists, but probably half the film is just details about apartheid and what happened. That was interesting and informative, but it was also depressing and not my key interest in the film. I wanted this to be more about African music: what makes it special, unusual, interesting, unique, and so on.
Granted, the history and purpose of the music is caught up with apartheid so you need some background to understand the context, but if I hadn’t see the title of this and been told it was about music, I probably would have just thought this was an apartheid documentary with a greater preponderance of musicians interviewed.
Still, this is quite a wonderful look at an important topic and I’m glad it was made and that I got to see it. (It’s not new: it’s over 10 years old and was made by HBO.) It’s definitely worth seeing if you’re interested in Africa, apartheid, revolutions, or music.
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