One of the best accolades for Cape Town is the news that ‘Searching for Sugar Man‘ is one of five films nominated for the Academy Awards in the Documentary Feature category, and that ‘Asad‘ has been nominated for Short Film (Live Action).
‘Searching for Sugar Man’ tells the story of Capetonian Sugar Segerman’s search for Seventies American rock star Rodriguez, who was more popular in South Africa than in any other country, and who ‘disappeared’. Through an internet appeal, Segerman found Rodriguez and brought him back to South Africa for a series of concerts in the Nineties. Swedish film producer Malik Bendjelloul heard about the Rodriguez story from Segerman, and made a documentary, which won acclaim at the Sundance Film Festival when it was launched last year. Not only has the documentary been nominated for an Oscar, but it also has been named Best Documentary Feature in the Critics Choice Awards, according to 2Oceansvibe. The bulk of the film is shot in Cape Town, and shows off our City’s icons such as Table Mountain, Lion’s Head, Camps Bay beach, and the scenic Victoria Road between Camps Bay and Hout Bay, with the Twelve Apostles as a backdrop. Segerman’s record shop Mabu Vinyls off Kloof Street is also featured. We are surprised by the word for word copying without acknowledgement to the source in the media statement by Mariette du Toit-Helmbold, CEO of Cape Town Tourism, about the role Cape Town plays in the documentary, from our first blogpost about the documentary. Cape Town Tourism ignored the local release of the documentary on the cinema circuit four months ago, despite its focus on Cape Town, proving how out of touch it is with news about our city! One can safely speculate that Mrs Helmbold and her PR and Communications Manager Skye Grove have not seen the film!
‘Asad’ was produced by Capetonian producer Rafiq Samsodien, states the media release from Alan Winde, Minister of Finance, Economic Development, and Tourism, and tells the tale of a boy who struggles to survive in war-torn Somalia. The film was shot in Paternoster, and used Cape Town residents. The film has already won acclaim at the Austin Film Festival, New Orleans Film Festival, Rhode island Film Festival, and Tribeca Film Festival.
Just being included on the Academy Awards nominations list will boost cinema viewership of the two films, and therefore will promote brands Cape Town and Western Cape in the next two months. It will also boost the Western Cape as a film destination, offering the services of producers, animators, directors, screenwriters, actors and cinematographers, said Minister Winde.
Chris von Ulmenstein, Whale Cottage Portfolio: www.whalecottage.com Twitter: @WhaleCottage
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It’s STEVE Segerman, Chris. Not Sugar Segerman.
You should stick to cooking and wine tasting Sonia.
His real name is STEPHEN, but he is best known by his nickname ‘Sugar’!
Chris
Excellent piece, Chris! Sonia I am surprised that you are such a keen reader of this blog!
Isn’t it funny Lolla that Sonia slates everything about this blog (you should see the collection of unpublished derogatory comments she has written) and has blocked us on Twitter, yet she (obsessively) reads, sleeps and breathes Whale Cottage venom! Sad life she must have. I’m planning to publish a book of hateful comments and Tweets soon, and she would feature prominently!
Chris
Good luck with finding a publisher, Chris.
Thank you Sonia.
We’ll start with Random House Struik!
Isn’t two Comments and two reads of the same blogpost a bit much for one day?
Chris
Chris, I stumbled across a post on journalist Herman Lategan’s wall. A disgusting piece written by Sonia. Why was this piece and all the comments not published on your blog? Surely it would make your readers who are not friends with Herman realise what kind of person Sonia is?
Yes Lolla, that was an unpublished Comment on our blog by Sonia Cabano, and was highly defamatory about Herman Lategan, in my opinion. I copy and pasted it to him privately, so that he could see it, and he chose to post it on his wall. It elicited more than 120 comments of support for Herman and generated severe criticism for Cabernet Cabano.
I did not want to post it on the blog as well, as it received wide interest on his Facebook page, and the blogpost was not about Herman. Sonia has more than shown her colours on our blog.
Chris