A Reasonable Man

A courtroom film set in South Africa. Sean is a corporate lawyer who has lived outside the country for years. On holiday in Zululand with his wife he comes upon something: in a village a young herdboy is standing with an axe and a baby is dead. The boy admits the killing but says one thing: he believed what he killed was not a baby but an evil spirit called the tokoloshe. Sean takes the case. The defence is not simple: can what a man genuinely believed count as a defence the law will accept? Against him are a prosecutor arguing modern law and a judge from the English tradition. The question is how a court assesses a belief outside its own view of the world. The narrative gives no easy answer. Sean's own past is part of the story; something that happened during his military service on the border still troubles him. Gavin Hood wrote, directed and starred; it is his first feature. Nigel Hawthorne plays the judge. The narrative starts from a case heard in 1933. An interesting example for anyone who likes courtroom drama and stories of cultural conflict. For a viewer expecting action, the film consists entirely of hearings and argument.