LOCAL filmmaker Judy Naidoo’s new movie, Kings of Mulberry Street: Let Love Reign, released on Netflix at the weekend.
After just a day on the popular stream channel the movie made the Top 10 film list in South Africa.
Naidoo, originally from Verulam, has gained wide acclaim in her career, spanning more than 20 years.
The multi-award-winning independent filmmaker has produced and directed several documentaries, short films and feature films.
These include the award-winning animation short Kahānikār (The Storyteller), which was long-listed for the Oscars in 2012 and won at several major festivals around the world.
Naidoo made her directorial debut ithe feature length film Hatchet Hour, which had its international premiere at the LA Femme International Film Festival (2016), where it won the Best Foreign Film award.
In 2019 her second feature Kings of Mulberry Street - set in the fictional town of Sugarhill District and shot on location in Verulam and Tongaat - won at major festivals in America and Sweden. Kings of Mulberry Street: Let Love Reign is Judy’s third feature film.
In an interview with POST Naidoo said they were approached by a Netflix aggregator who had seen the first film and was keen to come aboard for the second film.
“At that stage I was putting the finances together for the film and it just made sense in terms of the basic finance for film. One of the things I considered up front was how well the first film was received locally and internationally. There was clearly a world audience for the film.
“When you look at the number of international festivals the first film travelled to, and this was not just for screening at these festivals, it was in competition, which means it was part of an official selection and we won some of these international awards. It just made sense that there was an international audience for the film which we had not tapped into on the first film and I thought to do this film justice we needed to have that kind of international reach.”
Kings of Mulberry Street: Let Love Reign is set in 1993, during the time of South Africa’s first democratic elections, and tells the story of Baboo and Ticky four years later.
When Granny Chetty (Ma) is kidnapped by the fallen and disgraced police Commander Veerasamy, the boys are forced to play along with his schemes in-order to rescue her.
“I specifically and intentionally wrote it so that it is a standalone film, meaning that you do not need to have watched the first film to enjoy this one. When I conceived the idea originally I had always thought of it as being a two parter. One was going to be during the latter days of apartheid, which was the first film set in 1989.
“This film is set in 1993 which was the dawn of a new democracy. The second film is set in a very interesting time for me. We were on the brink of democracy, the world was changing, people had different expectations. Some people saw it as being a celebration of freedom and opportunity and promise and hope; and then there were some people who were just not too keen on it happening.
“For me all of this was very interesting for that time so when I wrote the new film I was looking at what was happening on the ground with people. That forms the backdrop and it inspires the story. The kind of subtle political background. Then we tell the story of the two boys,” said Naidoo.
She said the lead characters are now pre-teen, on the brink of becoming teenagers.
“So they are in themselves changing, the world around them is changing, and so I found that type of story quite inspiring. I wanted to bring back some of that feeling that we had in 1994 when there was a sense of hope and unity that people had.”
Naidoo said the film features some familiar and some new faces and characters.
“Shaan Nathoo resumes his role as Baboo, and Liam Dunpath now plays Ticky. The roles were written for pre-teens, it was written for two 12 year old boys. Shaan is actually 12. We couldn't recast the previous Ticky because he is much older now. He was 16 at the time of shooting. So we had to consider what would work for the story and what is believable. We have a brilliantly performed Ticky by the new kid, Liam, who took on really big shoes and he filled them out beautifully.”
She said the cast of this film had doubled and featured old and new faces including Hamish Kyd, Kogie Naidoo, Bertha le Roux-Wahl, Kaseran Pillay, popular TikTok star Riyaad Nakooda and award winning comedian Carvin H Goldstone.
POST