Clouds of revolution

ELAINE Proctor's first feature film, Friends, is a moving story about

three young women, two white, one black, living in Johannesburg whose

lives are thrown into crisis when one of the white women is revealed as

an ANC activist and bomber.

Born in Johannesburg -- her mother is Afrikaans, her father, a

pathologist who represented Steve Biko's family after his murder -- she

grew up fully aware of the impact of apartheid on everyday life. Her

brother was in exile in defiance of conscription into the army, an

Afrikaaner uncle was on the far right of the pro-apartheid movement. She

went to the progressive Woodmead School, and then trained as an actress.

Finding the work available to her in South Africa, mostly in

television, was vacuous and uninteresting, she opted to study film

instead and came to London to study at the London International Film

School. She returned home to make a series of documentaries about the

racial and political conflict there, and in 1986 came back to Britain to

study at the National Film and Television School at Beaconsfield. Her

graduation film, On the Wire, about a soldier undergoing psychological

trauma, won the BFI award for best feature in 1991.

In Britain to promote Friends, she was both pessimistic and optimistic

about what is happening in South Africa. Things had not changed since

she made the film, and everyone was still killing, she said. But the

fact that the elections, to be held in March, were ''written in stone''

was an important shift and hopefully after that things would improve.

''It could be argued that an ANC victory would be something to

celebrate,'' she said. ''I think they will be democratic and reverse

some of the imbalances of the past, but I fear that the forces on the

right, both of the white and black communities, will be intolerant of

that victory and continue to respond violently. I am not sure what the

forces of the state will do then.''

She believed that the good would outweigh the potentially damaging

response, but thought that the white right had been underestimated.

''It does not take a lot of people to exploit the existing ideological

and political differences, and the moment that happens you are talking

of large numbers of other people fighting,'' she said. ''That is the

problem with the far right, and there are also very conservative black

elements like Inkatha.''

What depressed her most was the culture of violence in which children

were growing up. Most children of colour in South Africa had grown up in

extremely violent circumstances and learnt incredibly violent responses,

she said.

The apartheid years had created a real culture of violence that was

not going to go away immediately. But there were a lot of things going

on which implied things were getting better for the people. If the ANC

did half of what they were promising to do more people would be better

off than they were now.

''Once the power base is changed there is a possibility people's lives

will be improved and that is something to be pleased about,'' she added.

''Do people have too great expectations? Unfortunately, I think they do.

There will be a lot of limitations on the new government because the

economy is not healthy, and what it will cost in terms of administrators

and skilled people and hard finance to alter the current situation

sufficiently will mean some people do not get what they were promised.

They cannot all be housed, health care and schools cannot immediately be

improved.

''The effects of the apartheid system on life must be changed as soon

as possible and I am concerned there may not be the resources to do that

as quickly and completely as it should be done.''

White South Africans would go through something of a revolution in the

years to come, she added. They would always live there and be South

African but it was going to be a delicate process. ''I am hopeful about

the future, but I am very saddened because there will be much violence,

death, and destruction. But at least the process of change is happening

at last.''

Filming Friends took her to the township of Wattville in East Rand,

although the original intention had been to use Alexandra township. The

situation there and in Soweto was, however, too volatile whereas

Wattville, outside Johannesburg, although poor, was as healthy a ghetto

as one could get. Because of good leadership it had not been divided by

the spiralling voilence which has affected other townships.

''There were times we were in some relative danger, but no more than

someone shooting a film in East Los Angeles. We spoke to everyone in the

township about it because in my experience it is better for people to

know what your intentions are in an environment like that. We spoke to

the ANC. They did not censor us. We spoke to the local civic committees

about what we were doing. We never felt in any kind of danger and we

filmed at night and in difficult circumstances.

''It was a measure of what organisation can do. It was impossible to

put a foot in Alexandra township. What we had to do was find pockets of

peace in a place riven by general violence.''

* Friends is showing at Filmhouse now and at GFT from January 30.