An Act of Defiance

South Africa, 1963. Ten men are arrested at a farmhouse in Rivonia, charged with preparing acts of sabotage against the apartheid regime. Bram Fischer takes on the lead counsel’s role in the trial. He soon finds that Nelson Mandela is among the accused. Mandela urges his fellow defendants to plead not guilty and to make the order itself visible. As the trial goes badly, Mandela gives the speech known for the words I am prepared to die. The film tells a political reckoning that takes place in a courtroom. At the centre stands the lawyer’s fight as much as the trial itself. Peter Paul Muller and Sello Motloung appear in Jean van de Velde’s hundred and twenty four minute film, a joint South African and Dutch production, completed in 2017.