Lamentations of Judas

Boris Gerrets

The men of ‘32 Battalion’ were black Angolans fighting for white South Africa. Many of them were just boys back then. Now they spend their lives in the desert town of Pomfret, struggling with doubts and regret. Can there be redemption for these men?

After the MPLA won Angola’s war of independence in 1975, many of its defeated enemies from the FNLA went on to fight for the South African army. Known as 32 Battalion, nicknamed ‘The Terrible Ones’, they fought in the service of the Apartheid regime against their black compatriots. Now the men tell their stories in Pomfret, an abandoned desert town where only they live, in squalid circumstances. Pomfret is also the backdrop for the re-enactment of the story of Jesus Christ and Judas Iskariot, in which the men play the disciples. Do they identify with the Romans who arrested Jesus? Or with Judas, personification of betrayal? The faces of the men tell a thousand stories: stories of heartache and regret, of doubt and pain. As one of them says: ‘The suffering is too much. And we suffer for nothing.’

Credits

Director
Boris Gerrets
Producer
Iris Lammertsma, Eric Velthuis
Year
2020
Country of production
Netherlands, The, France
Type
Documentary
Duration
93 minutes
Spoken language
English, Portuguese
Subtitles
EN
Production company
Witfilm
Dutch distributor
Cinema Delicatessen