Skin (2009)

Drama

www.skinthemovie.net

Currently showing in the following Cinemas

Bloemfontein: Northridge (starts Fri.March 19th-25th)
Botswana: Game City (starts Fri.March 19th-25th)
Cape Town: Blue Route (starts Fri.March 19th-25th)
Johannesburg: Rosebank Nouveau 2 (Starts Fri.March 19th-25th)
Johannesburg: Goodhope Entert (starts Fri.March 19th-25th)
Kimberly: Diamond Pavilion 1 (starts Fri.March 19th-25th)
KZN - Pietermaritzburg: Waterfall 1(starts Fri.March 19th-25th)

Cast

Sophie Okonedo Sam Neill Alice Krige Tony Kgoroge

Logline

SKIN is a story of family, forgiveness and the triumph of the human spirit.

Synopsis

Sandra is sent to a boarding school in the neighbouring town of Piet Retief, where her (white) brother Leon is also studying, but parents and teachers complain that she doesn’t belong. She is examined by State officials, reclassified as ‘Coloured’, and expelled from the school. Sandra’s parents are shocked, but Abraham fights through the courts to have the classification reversed. The story becomes an international scandal and media pressure forces the law to change, so that Sandra becomes officially ‘White’ again.

By the time she is 17, Sandra realises she is never going to be accepted by the white community. She falls in love with Petrus — a black man, the local vegetable seller, and begins an illicit love affair. Abraham threatens to shoot Petrus and disown Sandra. Sannie is torn between her husband’s rage and her daughter’s predicament.

Sandra elopes with Petrus to Swaziland. Abraham alerts the police, has them arrested and put in prison. Sandra is told by the local magistrate to go home, but she refuses. She is pregnant, and has made up her mind that her life is with Petrus now. Her father and brothers sever all ties with her, but her mother holds out hope for reconciliation.

Now Sandra must live her life, for the first time, as a black woman in South Africa — with no running water, no sanitation, and little income. She and Petrus have two children, and although she feels more at home in this community, she desperately misses her parents and yearns for a reunion.

Sandra eventually hears of her father’s death and becomes obsessed with the idea of finding her mother. Going back to the bureaucratic institutions that determined her fate, Sandra eventually tracks her mother down in a nursing home outside Pretoria. Sannie has had three strokes and is very frail — but the need for mutual forgiveness is very strong. Sandra and her mother have a moving reunion, affirming that the bonds of family are stronger than any racial division.

Festivals

AFI Fest
AFI Dallas
Pan African Film Festival, Los Angeles
Santa Barbara International Film Festival
Toronto International Film Festival

Awards

Winner - Audience Award - Afrika Film Festival,Belgium (2009)
Winner - Audience Award - AFI Dallas
Winner - Audience & Jury Favorite Awards - Pan African Film Festival, Los Angeles
Winner - Audience Award - Santa Barbara
Winner - First Film Award - Time for Peace
Best Feature Film - Palm Beach International Film Festival 2009
Circle Audience Award - Film Fest DC - Washington DC 2009