Mandla Langa
2009 Joint Overall Chairperson of the SAFTA Judging panel
Currently Chairman of MultiChoice South Africa's black economic empowerment initiative, Phuthuma Nathi, Mandla Langa is the former Chairperson of Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (ICASA) and also served as SABC Board member.
Langa sits on the boards of the Business and Arts South Africa (BASA), the Foundation for Global Dialogue (FGD), Horizon Strategies, and Institute for the Advancement of Journalism (IAJ) and the Rhodes University School for Economic Journalism. He is a trustee of the Nation's Trust and the South African Screenwriters' Laboratory (SCRAWL). He also serves as the director to Contemporary African Music and Arts (CAMA). He has been the editor-at-large of Leadership Magazine and the Program Director for television at the SABC.
His published works include Tenderness of Blood (1987), A Rainbow on a Paper Sky (1989), The Naked Song and Other Stories (1997) and The Memory of Stones (2000).
Hannellie Bekker
2009 Joint Overall Chairperson of the SAFTA Judging panel
Hannelie Bekker started working in television in 1992, producing and presenting short inserts for a magazine programme on Bop-TV. Moving to the SABC, she was part of the teams that started TSS, NNTV and SABC 3, nearly always working in programming. As an international buyer she introduced Sex & the City, Survivor, The Amazing Race and countless other international programmes to South African audiences.
As Head of Programmes at SABC 3, she was responsible for the editorial management of the channel. She initiated and oversaw the so-called "turnaround" of Isidingo in 2001/2002, and was responsible for the commissioning and/or development of local shows like 3 Talk, Going Nowhere Slowly, The Weakest Link, Hard Copy, and The LAB. She was also part of the team that devised cross-channel programming and scheduling strategies.
In 2005, Bekker joined Videovision Entertainment for a sojourn into feature films. When that company became a shareholder in Telkom Media, however, the lure of starting up a new subscription broadcasting service in South Africa proved irresistible. She is currently GM: Entertainment at Telkom Media, with the task of conceptualizing a multi-platform subscription broadcasting offering that will help enable the growth of the pay-tv market in South Africa. Apart from overall strategy development, this includes overseeing the design of local channels, the acquisition of international channels and programmes, the formulation of policy and procedures (including the development of innovative terms of trade and commissioning practices), and the briefing and acquisition processes.
Barry Berk
2009 SAFTA Judging Panel Chairperson and Judge
Barry Berk is a writer-director who initially studied acting at the University of Cape Town's Drama Department, after which he spent two years acting on the stage. From 1990 to 1993 he studied film at New York University's Graduate Film Programme.
In 1996 he directed Angel for MNet's New Directions Series. At the South African Avanti Television and Video Awards, he won the Best Director of the Year Award. The film also garnered the Best Actress Award. At the 2nd International Film Market in Cape Town, he received the Most Promising Newcomer Award in the Fiction Category. In 1999, he directed for television series Soul City. For this he shared the Best Director Award at the South African Avanti Television and Video Awards. One of his episodes also garnered both the Best Actress and Best Supporting Actress awards.
In 2000 he wrote and co-directed Yizo Yizo, a television series. One of the episodes he wrote and directed garnered the Best International Series award at Cinema Toute Ecran in Geneva. In 2002 he wrote and directed Gaz 'Lam, a thirteen-part drama-series for SABC1. In 2003 he directed three episodes of Zero Tolerance, a SABC 2 series. In 2005-2006 he head-wrote and directed the majority of The Lab, a 13 x 1-hour drama series, for Curious Pictures. He has also written feature-film scripts, amongst them Numb and Antoinette.
Thandi Brewer
2009 SAFTA Judging Panel Chairperson and Judge
Thandi Brewer is an award winning writer, director, actress, poet and teacher who lived in Johannesburg before moving to rural Hennops River. Brewer is a versatile writer whose work has won her countless awards and recognition worldwide. Most notably, she won the Soundscapes competition in 1995 for Best South African play for her first play "Samuel's Fugue", which was nominated for an Artes award for Best script in 1996.
Brewer's other work includes local series for various SABC channels. She now also works on international film scripts, like Paris Le Cap, The Weatherman, 12 Dancing Princesses, Story of An African Farm and Corner Pocket. She was selected for the Sediba writer's workshop in 2005. This led to a senior script editor position for the SABC/Sediba workshop, which in turn has led to heading up the Spark 1 writers programme for the NFVF and Sediba, and working with new writers in Kenya for MNet. She wrote and co-produced with Bridget Pickering the series "Usindiso/Redemption!!" Hugely successful, it reaches an audience of 4.3 million viewers a night on SABC 1. "Usindiso" is a regional finalist for best drama series for the International Emmy's in 2008.
She's worked as Head of Creative Development at Peakviewing Transatlantic, an international film company that made up to four movies a year in South Africa. Now she's formed her own company Tunc Productions. Together with Ian von Memerty they produced "Rockatutu" for the South African Ballet Theatre last year, which segued into "Music and Mayhem" in 2005, "Jump 4 Joy" in 2006, "the Heart is Round" in 2007 and Gunslingers slated for production in 2009.
Pule Diphare
2009 SAFTA Judging Panel Chairperson and Judge
Pule Diphare is a self-taught, accomplished award-winning filmmaker. Mentored by Scottish filmmaker, Jim Macintyre, he rose through erstwhile Bop-TVs ranks writing and directing society inserts for TV magazine Panorama, winning a Marang Award (Best Video Director) for The Making of Stainless Glass in his first year. He wrote and directed social inserts for Polls Broadcast 94' on joint SABC/Bop TV Channel and wrote and directed Bazaruto, a short documentary on Bazaruto Islands, as well as various magazine projects contributing to Bop-TV winning Children's Broadcast Award 1995 in Australia.
In 1998 he directed a short documentary titled The Rastafarians for Logic Pictures. In 1999 he developed, wrote and directed his acclaimed film JG Strijdom is very very Dead (Silver Avanti 2000 for best documentary) which was selected at several local and international screenings. Funded by the National Film and Video Foundation and Department of Arts and Culture, he produced, wrote and directed controversial documentary Dance of the Graves in 2002. In 2003, he developed, wrote and directed A Date with Helvetia. He was Finalist at the MNet New Directions Africa Initiative (documentary).
Diphare occasionally shares his creative skills to aspirant documentary filmmakers (Wits TV) and facilitated at Youth Film Culture, sponsored by Nelson Mandela Children's Fund and SABC. He received a Non-Academic Merit Award for Leadership in Documentary film Production (Faculty of Human & Social Sciences, UNW) and is a frequent panelist at local and regional documentary film forums. He filmed extensively for Social Institutes (Freedom Park Trust, OSISA, Ikssa Trust, Rivone, SACAR) and served in various film industry formations.
Kgomotso Matsunyane
2009 SAFTA Judging Panel Chairperson and Judge
Kgomotso Matsunyane is one of a dynamic breed of new players in the South African media landscape. An International Relations graduate from Carleton College in Minnesota (USA), Matsunyane is an accomplished television director and documentary producer, and was a writer on the award winning Yizo Yizo II series. She subsequently worked as a commissioning editor for local drama at SABC 1, the largest TV channel in the country, where she was responsible for projects like Gaz 'Lam, Tsha Tsha and Generations. She recently completed a successful stint as the editor of O, The Oprah Magazine in South Africa.
Matsunyane currently runs T.O.M Pictures, a film and TV company. Until recently, she wrote a popular column every Thursday for News24.com, and her new talk show, "Late night with Kgomotso" is on SABC 2 every Saturday. Recently Matsunyane was honoured by the Gauteng Finance and Economic Affairs Department by winning the "Passing of the Torch Award" for Women in Film.
Diliza Moabi
2009 SAFTA Judging Panel Chairperson and Judge
After receiving a diploma in Journalism from Birnam Business College, Moabi studied film production at Newtown Film and Television school. As an editor he has worked on various television programmes including drama, documentaries, music videos, commercials and corporate videos over a 9-year period. Some of the documentaries include: 'Irvin Khoza - Unauthorized' (SABC 3), Black Beaulahs (SABC 1) and 'Mandela - 'The Royal Revolutionary' (SABC). He worked as editor on SABC 1 Drama Series, 'Mthumzi We Ntaba', 'Entabeni, as well as MNet short films 'Mozart' and 'The Lovers', which he co-produced.
He spent two years working in the commercials industry for Terraplane Digital. While still with Trendyworx Productions, a company he co-founded, between 2004-2005 he also edited and co-directed corporate videos for clients such as Discovery Health, Gauteng Department of Housing, Absa and Telkom directory Services. He has edited a series of Omo and Teba Bank commercials for Velocity Afrika.
Jerry Mofokeng
2009 SAFTA Judging Panel Chairperson and Judge
Jerry Mofokeng has become one of the household names in film and television in South Africa. Beginning with the role of Duma in The Line to his role in The Lab, his background in theatre and in the academics brings a depth in his interpretation of the roles that he has portrayed on our screens. In the past two years Mofokeng has received Golden Horn awards for his roles in When We Were Black and in Max and Mona.
Mofokeng is an all-round professional and practitioner. He holds a Dramatic Arts degree from Wits and an MFA degree from Columbia University. At this point in his career he fills the roles of mentor, teacher, producer, director those roles that see him transferring his skills to the next generation of professionals. It is this experience that he brings to the panel.
Akin Omotoso
2009 SAFTA Judging Panel Chairperson and Judge
Akin Omotoso is one of a new breed of young talented black actors and directors who are making inroads into the small and selective film industry. The 34-year old Omotoso made his acting debut on stage at the University of Cape Town's Drama School. He has further appeared in productions including Isidingo on SABC 3, Big Oakes and most notably on Generations, through which he became a household name.
In 2000 he wrote, directed and produced his debut feature film God Is African. In 2003, together with Kgomotso Matsunyane and Robbie Thorpe, Omotoso started T.O.M. Pictures. He has since produced and directed films and television shows including the sitcom Nomzamo (SABC 1), the documentary Gathering the Scattered Cousins (which was selected for the Toronto film festival), and the short film Rifle Road (which was selected for the Cannes film festival).
Among other accolades, Omotoso won the Standard Bank Young Artist Award For Film in 2007.
Robbie Thorpe
2009 SAFTA Judging Panel Chairperson and Judge
Robbie Thorpe has worked in film and television production industry for over 25 years. He has worked as a producer in television, film and commercials and currently is a partner in T.O.M. Pictures.
For T.O.M. Pictures Thorpe has produced the multi-award winning feature film Gums & Noses and is currently developing In the Shadow of a Saint a South Africa-Canada co-production starring Djimon Hounsou (Blood Diamond). Recent television includes the Emmy nominated comedy series Sorted and the drama series A Place Called Home.
