Sonrise Films has just finished production on The President’s Patient, a telefilm that will challenge society to take a fresh look at itself and rethink some of its embedded prejudices against people who look and behave differently.
The film is written by artist /journalist Goodenough Mashego (Cast the First Stone) and directed by King Shaft Moropane, who has co-written and directed films, music videos, advertisements and corporate film projects.
The President’s Patient is based on the story of Monde, a homeless mentally disturbed man who prowls the streets of Newtown pushing his trolley searching for friendship and camaraderie. One day Monde finds himself on the scene of an attempted assassination of a new minister with radical ideas.
Unbeknown to him he is thrust into the centre of a five day manhunt headed by a team of special agents from three security branches: Organised Crime, Crime Intelligence and the State Security Agency. The team looking for him deploys state of the art tools in their hunt. However, unknown to the Lieutenant heading the team, it has been deeply compromised.
As a consequence every move they make is replicated by the two ruthless assassins whose instructions from their boss Ismail Soobramoney is not to leave Johannesburg until “the madman is killed’. Monde has no clue of what he witnessed. And the hunt becomes more interesting.
The film was wholly shot in Newtown, except for a few scenes which were done at Constitution Hill and the Gauteng Film Office.
The President’s Patient is an M-Net Mzansi Magic commissioned film which will raise awareness about the importance of not judging a book by its cover as a twist in the film will reveal the circumstances surrounding Monde’s homelessness and the family left behind.
It stars Regina Dube, Paul Mzaca, Momelezi Ntshiba, Thabo Monareng, Napo Masheane, Mofenyi Malepe, Motlatsi Mahloko and a very popular Alexandra township artist named Prince Twala, known as the Prince of Newtown.
To express his faith in this film director/producer Moropane joked that “if this film does not bring lots of awards and get the proper acclaim you might either find me working as a grocery store till operator or at the post office licking stamps’.
Moropane was contracted to shoot three films by the pay-TV channel and The President’ Patient is his second in the series. Mashego, a Mpumalanga native whose company Tenworkers Media co-produced the film, is a 360 degrees artist who has two poetry books to his name, blogs incessantly, is a literary editor, a literature judge, a practising journalist, political analyst, music producer and a filmmaker.
The President’s Patient will be screened on Mzansi Magic soon.
