Thing with No Name: HIV/AIDS in South Africa
Sarah Friedland, a filmmaker and friend who has collaborated with us in producing documentaries about health activists, is currently on tour with Thing with no Name, a film she directed about HIV in South Africa. Its next showing will be at the Starz Denver Film Festival from November 13 to 19,2008.
The film, shot in the summer of 2006, traces two Zulu women with AIDS as they begin treatment with anti-retroviral medications. The following You Tube clip gives a sense of the issues raised by the movie as well as its visual beauty and quiet flow.
Here is their description of the film:
Thing With No Name, a feature-length documentary, is an intimate portrait that follows two women with full-blown AIDS in rural South Africa as they try to access treatment through the public sector. The film takes the viewer to Okhahlamba, a traditional Zulu area nestled in the shadow of the Drakensburg Mountains, a stunning UNESCO World Heritage Site. Filmmakers Sarah Friedland and Esy Casey were introduced to this community by one of its members, their friend and Ground Producer Phumzile Ndlovu.
Through this connection, the filmmakers were able to integrate into the families with ease, participating in the daily activities of people living with the illness, and sharing in their moments of pain, joy, and humor.
This film is a portrait of two families, and more specifically, two individuals: Danisile Mvula and Ntombeleni Mlangeni. The film opens with both women describing their history and understanding of HIV/AIDS. From there, it takes the viewer through both womens’ experiences as they initiate treatment. Danisile responds well to the medications that she is now committed to for the rest of her life; she creates nicknames to help her remember the different pills, and goes over the protocol with her family and her homebased caregiver, a volunteer nurse. Ntombeleni does not respond as positively, losing all strength. Unable to walk, she is carried home from the hospital on her sister-in-law’s back. She becomes delirious, refusing to take the medicine, but gradually adjusts to it, and there is a brief moment of calm as both women begin their new reality. At this stage, other aspects of Ntombeleni and Danisile’s lives are explored: Danisile’s strained relationship with her teenage daughter, and the traditional Zulu ceremonies that Ntombeleni’s family
holds to combat her illness in their own way.
The filmmakers have also produced a production blog recounting the story of the movie’s creation and current distribution. For an interview with Sarah Friedland, see Indiewire.
posted by Matt Anderson, MD
