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MovieMail's Review
This contentious, award-winning film about a white Zimbabwean farmer trying to take Robert Mugabe to court is an effective account of a shocking political situation, says Nick Riddle.
An Oscar-nominated documentary, Mugabe and the White African does what any effective account of a shocking political situation has to do: it gets personal. Mike Campbell, a seventysomething farmer, became embroiled in the land-grab instigated by President Mugabe's declaration that property owned by the country's white farmers - land bought legitimately - was to be handed over to black Zimbabweans (supposedly poor but, in practice, flunkeys and henchmen intent on asset-stripping).
The film follows Campbell and his son-in-law, Ben Freeth, as they bring their case before an international tribunal in Namibia, claiming racial discrimination and a violation of human rights. The case is repeatedly postponed, while more and more of Campbell's neighbours are forcibly evicted and beaten, and his own family and employees are threatened. The historical context of white colonialism is somewhat underplayed, but Zimbabwe's descent into violence and chaos comes over vividly, in sequences shot with hidden cameras at great personal risk to the filmmakers. Campbell and Freeth are hugely sympathetic subjects, dignified and stubborn to the last as they fight for their livelihood against fearsome odds.
Commentaries: Lucy Bailey, Andrew Thompson (Directors)
Documentaries: 'Al Jazeera, The Fabulous Picture Show'
Film Description
"I’m still the Hitler of the times. This Hitler has only one objective; justice for his people, sovereignty for his people. If that is Hitler, right… then let me be a Hitler ten-fold" - Robert Mugabe.
Set against the backdrop of the tumultuous 2008 presidential election, ‘Mugabe and the White African’ is an award-winning documentary that follows the attempt by a white Zimbabwean farmer to take President Robert Mugabe to an international court on charges of racism and human rights abuse. One of the few remaining white farmers left in Zimbabwe, Mike Campbell has witnessed firsthand the effect Mugabe's land seizure programme has had on the country. Ostensibly aimed at redistributing white-owned land to poor black Zimbabweans, the programme, instigated in 2000, has left once profitable farms lying idle and brought widespread food shortages and famine to the general population. As the 2008 election looms, the 74 year-old farmer, accompanied by his son-in-law Ben Freeth, begins his fight for justice.
Much of this film was shot covertly. To have been caught filming would have meant imprisonment.
"if they want to eat they need to have white farmers" -
Christian Allard on 28th July 2010
Mike Campbell acquired the large estate he calls a farm with all its farms and its 500 workers back in 1974 when a brutal white supremacist regime was running the coun... more >
Mike Campbell acquired the large estate he calls a farm with all its farms and its 500 workers back in 1974 when a brutal white supremacist regime was running the country they called Rhodesia.
I feel no sympathy for the South African army captain Mike Campbell and his British son in law Ben Freeth because I watched Freeth interviewing Campbell on youtube.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?vSbfhrr2NyH4
Have a look and watch Campbell telling the world if they want to eat they need to have white farmers.
I watched the documentary they call Mugabe and the White African and after watching the work of Ben Freeth on youtube I came to the conclusion that the directors of the documentary are Ben Freeth and Mike Campbell and not Lucy Bailey and Andrew Thompson. < less
