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Epic Story of Racheltjie de Beer Soon on our Big Screens.
The most anticipated Afrikaans film of the year, The Story of Racheltjie de Beer, releases nationwide in October 2019.
Based on the best-selling novel of the same name by writer and filmmaker Brett Michael Innes, the film tells the fabled story of Afrikaans family, the De Beers, who are forced to find shelter on a local farm in the Eastern Free State of South Africa in the 1800s. As winter arrives, and dark clouds laden with snow start to roll in over the Drakensberg Mountains, the scene is set for tragedy to strike.
What are the odds of survival against the powerful forces of the environment? As the father and his two children, and their shoddy wagon, trek through the harsh and unforgiving environment with the magnificent Drakensberg Mountains as the backdrop, it becomes clear how small people are in the face of nature.
The film was shot on location on the farm Tierhoek, in the rugged Eastern Free State. The filmmakers sought out a location that would express the harsh reality of living on a remote, isolated farm in the 1800s.
Apart from the live action, the film’s visual effects are remarkable, certainly in the realm of Afrikaans filmmaking. “VFX work include elements such as storm clouds, a leopard, a baboon, a zebra, and falling snow,” says producer Johan Kruger. “To the best of my knowledge no other Afrikaans film has made use of VFX at this level, and possibly no other local film, at least not without major international participation. For a number of reasons, shooting in winter and in real snow conditions was not an option, but the real magic with VFX lies in the elements and images it adds to the story.”
There are more than 220 visual effects in the film, according to Boshoff. “We wanted to attribute human characteristics and moods to the weather, and the storm in particular. For that reason, we didn’t just replace clear skies with stock images of clouds; instead we built our own cloud systems that could be manipulated and moved around as we chose. This allowed us to give the storm a personality, to let it turn darker, move faster, threaten the landscape with lightning.
The stellar cast features Stian Bam, Zonika De Vries, Marius Weyers, Sandra Prinsloo, Antoinette Louw and Beate Opperman, Starring in his first film role will be Johannes Jordaan in the role of Racheltjie’s little brother.
