Gangster’s Paradise: Jerusalema is about the rise and fall of crime lord Lucky Kunene, as it depicts his growth from small time car-jacker to big time crime boss in corruption-ridden Johannesburg, South Africa.
Lucky, along with his child-hood friend/partner-in-crime, Zakes, slowly become modern-day Robin Hoods for their people when they refuse to live in the crime infested dwellings owned by a White slumlord that doesn’t care about their situation.
During their rise, as they take over more and more downtrodden apartments to try and clean them up, they resort back to their childhood criminal ways of life and start doing business in that same manner, as they have to deal with a cop hell-bent on shutting him down and an upstart Nigerian drug dealer looking to get in an do business in Lucky’s new residential acquisitions.
Based off actual characters the writer/director grew up with, Gangster’s Paradise: Jerusalema is a mash-up of “Boys N the Hood,” “Heat,” and “New Jack City” with African flavor and it works. Very gritty (especially so, since it was shot on Super 16mm and 35mm) and very eye-opening as to how “wild, wild west” it gets in the Hillsboro section of Johannesburg, which is dubbed the crime capital of the world.
It flows in and out of English and subtitles – to which are sometimes hard to read and flash by too fast – but the many languages and dialects give it that genuine feel of the region, which certainly adds to the film. The acting is fantastic and the physical similarities between the actor that played the Young Lucky and the actor that played the Older Lucky is pretty dead-on.
Gangster’s Paradise: Jerusalema is in limited release in NY, LA (Pasadena), and Houston, so make sure you go get your gangsta on.
Writer/Director: Ralph Ziman
Cast: Daniel Buckland, Robert Hobbs, Eugene Khumbanyiwa, Motlatsi Mahloko, Jafta Mamabolo, Shelley Meskin, Kenneth Nkosi, Ronnie Nyakale, Louise Saint-Claire, Rapulana Seiphemo, Jeffrey Zekele
