The script gets straight to the point, opening with the leaflet bomb and trial. This requires Tim to create wooden copies of the keys their harsh guard (Page) carries around, so they can open the nine doors between them and freedom. ![]() Slowly a plan evolves to make their escape from the prison. In Pretoria Prison, they're held in a wing with other white prisoners of conscience, including long-icarcerated anti-apartheid activist Denis Goldberg (Hart) and French national Leonard (Winter). In 1978, Tim Jenkin and Stephen Lee (Radcliffe and Webber) are convicted of distributing illegal literature using leaflet bombs. Shooting in Australia with an international cast, British director Francis Annan keeps the film authentically gritty. This provides some depth to the story, which is carefully staged to create tension from the detailed twists and turns of this outrageous escape. As such, I had to rewind an awful lot of sentences (which you can’t do if you’re watching this in the cinema), and that did leave me wishing they’d just gone the route of forgoing them altogether, like some dramas do – such as Chernobyl, meaning we understand already that there will be such accents, but we don’t need them as an endless barrier throughout the production.Įscape from Pretoria is out tomorrow in cinemas, and is available to pre-order on Blu-ray and DVD, ahead of its release on April 27th.A straightforward prison-break thriller, this film has added interest because it's a true story about political activists locked up for fighting apartheid in late-1970s South Africa. But then I don’t think I’ve had any good ones on cinema, especially from Joss Ackland in Lethal Weapon 2. I just wish the screener I saw had subtitles, because the cod-South African accents aren’t brilliant. Overall, Escape from Pretoria is gripping entertainment with solid story, direction and acting throughout, and highly recommended. Tim (Daniel Radcliffe) in his delightful cell…Īlong the way, there’s tension aplenty when a ‘key’ gets stuck in the lock and, in fact, the tension is piled on in spades, since this is a prison where if you break the rules, you could get shot to death by a sniper… IF you’re lucky.Īround halfway through, there’s a scene involving heavy breathing, some of which is echoing amongst the surroundings, but for a few seconds in the middle of it, there’s no background noise whatsoever, making it sound like deep breathing in space, as if it’s made in honour of 2001: A Space Odyssey for a similar scene when Dave’s in space and trying to deal with HAL. Long-termer Denis Goldberg ( Ian Hart) – with four concurrent life sentences – befriends them and clues them in to life on the inside, but note that Pretoria Prison is not a place where you can just stop and expect someone to talk about your feelings and mental health issues, so if you’re of sound mind, then like Tim, you’d better start devising plans to get out of there… However, how do you get out of a locked door, especially when there’s a full steel panel in front of it? Once indoors, they get no pens, no newspapers, visits once a month – and none of them conjugall and as soon as Tim and Stephen enter, they’re looking all around to see what the potential escape routes are. Inside, the white guards see them as a “ white Mandela” and a traitor to their race. However, when it comes to hiding the money, there’s only one place the cops won’t look… and he’d best think warm thoughts!!! ![]() One would’ve thought that would be a good idea, but he won’t do it because those in control are “ fascists“. ![]() ![]() Set in 1979, the film begins with freedom fighters/terrorists (take your pick) Tim Jenkin ( Daniel Radcliffe – Horns, Imperium) and Stephen Lee ( Daniel Webber, above-right with Radcliffe and Mark Leonard Winter, left) being jailed for setting off bombs in public places – alebeit ones that exploded leaflets all over the place, in the fight for apartheid.Īlas, for the pair, they get 12 and 8 years, respectively, before Tim’s girlfriend, Daphne ( Ratidzo Mambo) gives him some cash, and tells him not to appeal. Escape from Pretoria is the South African Prison Break!
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