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On Location, Zululand - The Making Of Siliva the Zulu - Book

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On Location, Zululand - The Making Of Siliva the Zulu - Book.
W1706  × H1372 px
0.26  MB
2012
South Africa
In 1927, an Italian film crew landed in South Africa intending to make a film about a white woman abducted by Zulus. When this was forbidden by the white authorities, director Attilio Gatti decided instead to make a film about Zulu life. The book On Location, Zululand tells the story, through photos taken by the film crew at the time, of how the film came to be made, and of its unique place in the history of cinema.
Siliva The Zulu
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Document
Digital formats available:
PDF

Context

By Peter Davis ; photos by Lidio Cipriani, Giuseppe Paolo Vitrotti, Carlo Franzeri. 60 pages : illustrations, maps (some color) ; 22 x 29 cm.

Full download pdf available for purchase. Please contact for more details. Physical copies also available.

Context -

Gatti designed a melodrama that had little to do with Zulu culture, but which contained the first authentic scenes of Zulu life to be recorded at that time.

Having none of the racist sentiments of South African whites, the crew were able to live with and work on close terms with the Zulus, and managed to create the first full-length fiction film with an all-African cast to be made in South Africa, and possible in all of Africa. This film was Siliva the Zulu.

Coming as it did at the moment of impact of talkies, the film received minimal distribution in Italy, having no more than a half-dozen screenings, after which it disappeared until being pulled out of an archive by Villon Films, which added a soundtrack of traditional Zulu music, and offered the film for distribution.

Collection
Peter Davis
(140)
Collection of Peter Davis Stills, Films, and related items in the archive.
Collection
Books
(2)
Collection
Siliva the Zulu 1927
(164)
Materials relating to the dramatic silent fiction feature, Siliva the Zulu. A first look at Zulu life in South Africa.