The Northern Cape is huge, empty, bleak and strangely beautiful. In places the rocks are so black, it seems they’ve been burnt by the sun. This is the setting for Nêrens, Noord-Kaap, one of the best TV series I have seen.
The script is sparse and powerful; the language, expressive and down to earth. Words are not used unless absolutely necessary. There are other ways to tell this story. When there’s music, it’s the right music and not too much of it.
And ah, the acting. Frank Opperman, that versatile veteran, is heartbreakingly brilliant as widowed patriarch Lourens Adendorff, now a frail old man. He lost his wife years before and is still mourning her. His emotions sometimes seem as stunted as the shrubs on his remote farm, and his relationships with his three sons have suffered: he was a heavy-handed father.
Lourens is a complicated man, sometimes capable of startling depths. Asked at one point why he never remarried, he is able to growl, utterly convincingly: “Mens vang nie die son met jou hande twee keer in jou lewe nie [You don’t catch the sun in your hands twice in your life].”
This is the same actor who played the clownish Ouboet in Orkney Snork Nie!. Hard to believe.
Afrikaans TV has produced many popular comedies and soaps. Nêrens is nothing like those. It is beautiful, moving, sometimes poetic. Closest comparison is Verspeelde Lente, back in 1983(!), directed by the legendary Manie van Rensburg with magical moments from Elize Cawood.
In Nêrens Lourens has dementia. When his sons discover this — and without giving anything away — it changes the family dynamic.
There are a number of characters and actors, apart from Opperman as Lourens snr, who “catch the eye”, as the old theatre critics might have said. One is middle son Ronnie (Albert Pretorius), a gentle giant with a huge love for his teenage son, Lourens jnr (the remarkable Arnold Swart), from his first marriage. Every time Ronnie gets ready to make a wrong move you find yourself thinking: “Oh, Ronnie, don’t.” His partner, Suzette (Daneel van der Walt), is equally convincing and heartbreaking. That wonderfully expressive face. The young Lourens loves her deeply. He never has to say it. They share a secret that will change Ronnie’s life.
One of the side stories is about Lourens snr’s sister Ans (Marion Holm), a gay woman in a conservative village. She is played as tough, unapproachable, with a face like iron. But when she lights up with happiness … oh, my. The development of the long-concealed love between her and childhood friend Henna, played by Nicole Holm (yes, they are related), is one of many gems.
The script is sparse and powerful; the language, expressive and down to earth
Some of my friends say Nêrens is too slow for them. But that gradual, deliberate pace, the gentle unwrapping of the storyline, is what makes it so good. There are English subtitles but often these simply highlight the wonderful Afrikaans script. A village event is coming up and the subtitles say: “We’re going to dance our feet off!” The original is: “Vanaand gaan ons die ding los dans!” Which also alludes to their tangled lives and the sense that, just maybe, things might work out for some of them.
The series started life as a prize-winning play. If I’d known I may have tried to see it then. But in a way I’m glad I didn’t. It’s been so good on TV and the director, Nico Scheepers, who also wrote the original play and the TV screenplay, has used the landscape to great effect on the screen, complete with distant bakkies looking as small as dung beetles, slowly rolling along long roads and raising trails of dust. But all the time he is also drawing exquisite work from his cast. An enormous backdrop but intensely personal close-up performances. What a talent he is.
There is a parallel story involving the three brothers when they are children and here, too, the young actors are beautifully cast and directed.
It’s difficult not to name and praise the whole cast but space, as they say, is limited. Ilse Klink plays a key role as Maggie, the housekeeper/surrogate mother to the Adendorffs. Dean Balie is her son, farm foreman Jan-Jan. Geon Nel is the oldest brother, Frans; De Klerk Oelofse is laatlammetjie Andries.
News flash: The series I am watching is Part 2. It will finish on December 10. When it does I’ll find and start on Part 1. And if Part 3 turns up I’ll probably watch that too.
Nêrens, Noord-Kaap Deel 2 can be seen on KykNet (DStv 144) on Tuesdays at 8pm and on DStv Catchup.
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