Although it seems to be a ghetto movie, it very quickly becomes a much more intimate story, the story of this young, teenage, lost, crazy, out-of-control kid and a baby that he hides from his friends. |
I feel very, very proud to hold this (Oscar) because it tells me, and all of us at home, that we can do it. |
I want to thank my fellow nominees, who I've become deep friends with. We may have foreign-language films, but our stories are the same as your stories. They're about the human heart and emotion. |
I was frozen in my seat. It was the first time I had ever seen people like me on the screen. |
I'm in Los Angeles, and like almost everyone in this crazy business of ours, I watched on TV bleary-eyed. Being the last film to be announced [in the category], my heart was pounding. One isn't quite prepared for something like this. |
It's a rough mess, so anyone who buys it is getting a poor-quality version. |
It's when [the subject] makes eye contact with you, and there's that tiny moment of challenge, of vulnerability or sudden aggression or confusion or insecurity. You construct the movie out of those moments that happen between lines and beneath the lines, and then you're very lucky to have actors like Presley and Terry, who can deliver those very subtle moments in characters that don't say a huge amount. |
My parents have been car-jacked. I have been mugged. We all know what it is like. But do you write a story about the way it is, or the way it should, or could, or needs to be? |
One of the struggles and one of the exciting things for South African filmmakers is: What stories are we allowed to tell? I hope for the industry that more and more, it will tell whatever stories it likes. |
Our stories are the same as your stories. They're about the human heart and emotion. |
The first question after every screening is, 'Where can I buy the soundtrack?', and that definitely helps the movie. |
This may sound melodramatic but I have never, ever worked so hard. The film will be released in a different country every week for the next six weeks. I've just come back from Germany, France and Sweden to be in LA for the nominations and to speak to the American press. |
We are excited to be in Cape Town. |
We arranged a meeting in Los Angeles with big name stars, but I had to drop the idea. I wanted to film in the local Soweto dialect that only Soweto youth can speak and believed that shooting in any other language would dilute the impact of the film. |
We grew up watching American films and I hope that Americans will watch our stories. |