Disclaimer: This historic film was produced during the apartheid era in South Africa. It contains propaganda elements that explicitly or tacitly endorse racism and racial separation. It is presented solely for historical purposes, to help document in part a period of terrible repression.
"These Are South Africans" is a 1950s propaganda film from the South African Government Information Office that paints an idyllic picture of South Africa by showing the leisure lifestyle enjoyed almost exclusively by the country’s white citizens. The film opens with footage of the Parade of Uniforms in Cape Town celebrating the opening of parliament. Soldiers march in full uniform. A car drives up in front of Cape Town’s Parliament Building and Dr. E.G. Jansen, Governor-General of the Union of South Africa, gets out and walks into Parliament with his wife (02:46). There is a good shot of the coast of South Africa (03:48). A couple ride horses on a beach; people play in the surf. A woman boogie boards on a wave (05:05). A massive cargo liner sails around the Cape (05:48). Ships dock in in Table Bay. Viewers see the streets of Cape Town with double decker buses and people walking around (06:22). Several people sit on a peak, presumably Victoria Peak, overlooking Cape Town. Two women look out over the rocky coast. Boats are anchored in the harbor. Viewers see fishermen, primarily the descendants of Malays who immigrated to the Cape in the 17th and 18th centuries. Three people stop their car at an overlook on the Cape Peninsula (08:38). A horse-drawn buggy moves down a rural road (09:40). Viewers see the Drakenstein Valley and the regions old vineyards. Grapes hang from the well-established vines. A girl eats grapes in the vineyard. Colored women prepare table grapes for packing. A man samples a glass of wine (12:26). The film then shows some of the agricultural aspects of the country. A man drives a tractor pulling a wheat harvester (13:06). A mule team pulls a wheat harvester. A man drives a tractor and plow (14:36). Men look around an agricultural show in the small town of Parys. The show features Afrikaner cattle (15:33), a horse-drawn carriage race, and the showing of horses. Viewers see a few Ridgeback puppies. The film then cuts to another agricultural show at Johannesburg (18:10). Men ride horses in the arena; other men jump horses. An exhibit or booth promotes in-country tourism for white South Africans, encouraging them to go on “luxury safaris” to visit the “bantu Africans in their own tribal settings” (19:16). Next viewers see the Chamber of Mines building (19:48), where men ride a miniature train. A man fly fishes on a river. People relax at a pool inland from the coast (20:33). The film shows False Bay, east of Cape Town, with its sandy beaches (21:08). Muizenberg’s beaches are packed with visitors. A family plays in the waves at the beach on the Atlantic side of the peninsula. Young people walk from a building at the University of Cape Town (23:35). Viewers see some of South Africa’s natural splendors-mountains, fields, and coastlines (24:30)-as well as a few shots of the cities before the film concludes with footage of the Governor-General leaving parliament at the end of the opening day celebration.
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15 июн 2024
