A film by Amil Shivji
Drama, 90min, color.
ZAF/TZA/DE 2021
© Big World Cinema / Kijiweni Productions / NiKo Film
Funded by: Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung, World Cinema Fund, Wanene Entertainment, M-Net, Copperlake Holdings, TSAR, Beaver Bay Investments
Synopsis
Vuta N’Kuvute (Tug of War) based on Adam Shafi’s award-winning Swahili novel, is a coming-of-age political drama about love and resistance set in the final years of British colonial Zanzibar. The film weaves through 1950s coastal culture across the divides of class and racial segregation that were imposed by the colonial regime. Denge, a frustrated and rebellious Zanzibari young man who is part of the freedom struggle against British rule meets Yasmin, a recent runaway Indian-Zanzibari bride whose equal rebelliousness drives her to seek her own independence. Their romantic but forlorn relationship is coupled with the daily struggles of finding their place in the resistance movements for independence.
Cast
Gudrun Columbus Mwanyika, Ikhlas Gafur Vora, Siti Amina
Crew
Producers | Steven Markovitz & Amil Shivji |
Executive Producers | Neil Tabatznik & Lucinde Englehart |
Co-producers | Tamsin Ranger & Nicole Gerhards |
Director | Amil Shivji |
Script | Amil Shivji & Jenna Bass |
Production Manager | Cindy K., Kate Mumbua, & Edwin Kariuki |
DoP | Zenn Van Zyl |
Editor | Nadia Ben Rachid & Mathew Swanepoel |
Original Sound | Frederic Salles |
Production Design | Emilia Roux & Eliudi Mwanyika |
Costume Design | Hawa Ally |
Festivals and Awards
Zanzibar International Film Festival 2022 (Tanzania) - Opening Film
Centrepiece Film New York African Film Festival 2022 (USA)
Seattle International Film Festival 2022 (USA) - Winner Special Jury Prize
Santa Barbara International Film Festival 2022 (USA)
Palm Springs International Film Festival 2022 - Nominated New Voices/New Visions Grand Jury Prize
Toronto International Film Festival 2021
Toronto Black Film Festival
Winner Doha Film Institute Post Production Fund Spring 2020
Press
“Tug of War” is the first period drama in the history of the nascent Tanzanian film industry. It explores a little-known chapter in the archipelago evocatively referred to as the “Spice Islands,” whose white-sand beaches and UNESCO World Heritage Stone Town — among the top tourist attractions on the continent — paint an image of an island idyll frozen in time." Variety, Sept. 2021