Lemohang Jeremiah Mosese, writer/director. This is Not a Burial, It’s a Resurrection. 2019. 120 minutes. Sotho. Lesotho. Urucu Media. No price reported.

Abstract

This is Not a Burial, It’s a Resurrection was shot by Lemohang Jeremiah Mosese in his native Lesotho. The mountainous and landlocked country, entirely surrounded by South Africa, is given an international exposure through the artistic and aesthetic commitment of thefilmdirector. Thefilm gained awide visibility through screening at several international film festivals (including winning the Sundance special jury prize in 2020 for visionary filmmaking) as well as receiving Lesotho’s first Academy Awards nomination for Best International Feature Film. The film is narrated by a lesiba player (the lesiba is an instrument traditionally played by Lesotho shepherds), who starts by telling the story of Nazaretha, called the “valley of tears,” prior to the arrival of French missionaries in Lesotho. Nazaretha’s story revolves around the pain of its people and their land. More accurately, the pain of the land is materialized through the personal suffering and sacrifice of the main character, Mantoa, an eighty-year-old Mosotho widow who is confronted with her son’s death at the beginning of the narrative. But Mantoa’s grief is also presented as an integral part of the cataclysmic experiences brought by the processes of colonialism, postcolonialism, and global capitalism and the effects of their extractivist logic on Lesotho society. The pace of the film allows for a reflective and engaged viewing. The combination of cinematography, mise-en-scène, and dissonant soundscapes interrupts what could have been a traditional linear storyline, creating instead a multilayered and symbolically rich narrative. The narrative devices are open for numerous readings around such themes as identity, death (physical and spiritual), grief, and resilience (but also acceptance and defeat), intertwined into a complex critical ode to the land and a presentation of land as Mother. One underlying theme that links the land and the pain of the woman is labor migration to South African mines. Mantoa’s son never came back from his shift in the mines, and this allows the film to examine a practice that has