Goodbye Bafana

1. In general, what did you like and dislike about the film?

I like the history of Gregory, I think is very interesting how the director shows the guardian of Mandela, is like he tried to make more human the figure of this man. I don’t know if this story was real, but I ask myself why the director make a film not real?, specially if the Mandela figure is mentioned all the time.

To be honest, I don’t like the movie in general, the life of Gregory was so terrible, is very shocking how he lived and how their family was in danger only because he tried to treat a person like a human. Also is very confusing for me the relation between Nelson and Winnie, because in the last movie they relationship was so different, for example, they don’t touch and much less kiss each other, and in “Goodbye Bafana” they look like a normal couple, like the prison don’t make changes in their marriage.

2. Who was the character you liked the most and the character you liked the least in the film? Why?

I really hate Gregory’s wife, because in the beginning she was, and I sorry for my language, like a bitch, I can’t understand how exist people like her, who treats “black people” like garbage and she not even questioned that. When the movie is drawn on her character evolutioned, and I don’t believe in God, but THANKS GOD.

Another character who really hate was the fellow of Gregory in the office where they censored the letters for the prisoners, for people like him the world not evolucionate fast, for people like him the society perpetuate a system based in the superiority of small groups in relation with a big poblation.

Maybe I like the character of the Gregory’s daughter, because she questioned the laws, the violence and repression since she was a kid, and that means we don’t born hate someone else, we start hate when the society and her culture is imposed, and nobody cares what are the things to imply this, specially if you are a beneficiary.

3. How do the versions of James Gregory, Nelson Mandela, and Winnie Mandela compare between  Goodbye Bafana and Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom?

“Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom” and “Goodbye Bafana” are two differents movies, because the figure of Mandela was different, in the sense of which are the personalities I could see, in the first film Nelson was a revolutionary, a politician, and a pacifist, in the latest film only I could see a man aislate of humanity, and maybe a few remains of their way of thinking about the armed struggle.

In relation with Winnie, I feel a little be disappointed, because I think she was very important to the struggle against to the apartheid, and I know this wasn’t about the struggle, but the figure of Winnie is showed only like the wife of Mandela and nothing else.

If I talk about Gregory I will say that I been impress with his life, I never thought that a guardian in South Africa knows the language of the african people, he was an example of multiculturalism, and obviously I feel so proud about the way he educate their son’s, because he tried to educated his family not like racist people, but on the contrary like normal people with differences but respect the other.