User Reviews

There is something haunting about this min-series. When I first saw it, for some odd reason I felt like I already knew the story of Shaka. The way I already knew the story of Paul Bunyan or John Henry or even Pecos Bill. Moreover, I felt like I already knew Shaka, knew of his deeds; too horrible to mention in polite society. He represented some kind of mythic archetype that somehow takes up permanent residence in the mind. That of the Black Destroyer perhaps. But beyond that, he still represents something ambiguous and amorphous in African consciousness. Something that goes beyond the gruesomeness and the blood and slaughter and death that he represents with many to address in a very modern way the concept of nation building and the spirit that organizes states and cultures. Something, one is tempted to say, that goes beyond Good and Evil.

Even though this is not a movie in the strictest sense of the word, I have to mention it here because Henry Cele's performance as Shaka stands up there with what George C. Scott did with PATTON, what Laurence Olivier did with HENRY THE FIFTH, or Denzel Washington with MALCOLM X, and yes, even what Robert Powell did with Jesus OF NAZARETH. I just want to go on record as saying it is one of the greatest performances of the Twentieth Century.

Because it takes ten episodes to tell his story, one feels a catharsis exhaust itself that is very much akin to what one might experience in the Theater. First of all, you get to see Shaka from the perspective of the Western viewpoint and in that context, he is no more than the odd colorful token you find in many Western films. A cameo figure like Baby Face Nelson in O BROTHER WHERE ART THOU. But as soon as the viewpoint shifts to an African perspective, the enchantment begins for me. Suddenly I see people like my aunts and uncles and black men and women I have seen in the neighborhood acting and responding as I have seen them act and respond to dramatic issues in Life.

Through it all there is Shaka, running from trouble with his mother and causing trouble with a vision that includes blood revenge and yet is curiously somehow beyond all that and is a reaching through all the narrowed eyed thirst for dominion through combat and conquest for a new, and as yet undefined reality better than the one that is to be lived. All my life I have seen men like Shaka, dark and lean, natural leaders who run bowling alleys or end up elite police officers or boxers or world champion martial artists or give lectures on African culture at our high school in front of their wives. The thing that became more and more riveting watching this min-series was how obvious it was that Henry Cele represented the original from which all the other versions sprang.

The other thing that was refreshing was how most of Shaka's problems did not have the mythical White Man as their source. Instead, his troubles revolved around political tensions derived from difficulties he was having with his own people with regard to his ties to family and tribe and an apocalyptic prophecy of cultural devastation.

At the end of this mini-series, despite all its flaws regarding continuity, one feels one has enjoyed the rare privilege of experiencing the epic sweep of a great life in both its grandeur and profoundly tragic limitations. But these are revealed as the limitations of humanity as well as Shaka's own. There is a moment at the end that felt like the spirit of the sixties, with people reaching out in both directions across the ocean to create a new understanding while not quite sure why they were doing so. There was that sense of being moved to create something larger than themselves. Something that would defy the degenerative process of societies and civilizations and the self-fulfilling prophecy of doom for nation states.

The Spirit of Shaka remains a haunting and troublesome reflection. All I really understand about Shaka's mystique is that there was this gifted sculptress named Ruth Gowens who did many worthy terra-cotta sculptures of Black Folks in scenes of Southern and Urban Life. But when it came time for her to do a life size sculpture of some great leader, she did not chose Martin Luther King or Malcolm X.

She chose Shaka.

A brilliant general and strategist, a great leader, Shaka (the beetle) is able to outwit the imperial delegation sent to confuse him with duplicity. "Francis," says Dr. Henry Fynn, "Shaka is eons ahead of you."

What I found interesting was the South African perspective with other nations with whom it shares the English language. The English are imperious like Victoria, desolate like George IV, arrogant like Lord Charles or flighty like LT Francis Farrell. Americans are described by the prod British merchant Zacharias Abrahams as "go ahead" ie overly eager.

The Irish represented by Dr Fynn get off easy. He is pleasantly amused at the British when in the middle of nowhere they raise the cross of St George and sing God Save the King. Fynn refuses to doff his hat for the occasion.

First time before the camera, Henry Cele a soccer goalie rendered a bravura performance embodying the character of the South African Hero Shaka. Regrettably he died young at age 61.