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Stephen Frears' haunting first film deals with the ultimate problems of apartheid both directly and obliquely.
It is oblique in so far as it presents the first day of a black revolution in South Africa through the uncomprehending eyes of a bewildered white child, his genteel grandmother. It is direct since its characters are constantly identifying themselves and others in terms of colour, while their refusal to face facts leads them inexorably to the burning of the coloured chauffeur.
Frears wisely avoids didacticism, and the horrors his film reflects are the more disturbing for being uncommented and frequently unseen. And the final image of the grandmother sitting watching the sunset as her civilisation disintegrates all round her is a metaphor more chilling than any direct argument.
Monthly Film Bulletin, September 1968
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1. White young master (4:43)
Production stills
