New S.A.F.E film explores radicalisation of coastal youth

a scene from the film, Watatu by SAFE Productions that will premiere premiere in Nairobi this coming Thursday evening at Prestige Plaza and run through the whole weekend. PHOTO | COURTESY

What you need to know:

  • Filmed entirely on location in Mombasa and devised by members of SAFE Pwani with support from the SAFE founding father, the award-winning British actor Nick Reding, Watatu also inspired input from the coastal communities who actually saw the story live and got a chance to not only respond to what they saw on stage, but also to express their views on what is to be done to nip the problem of youth radicalization in the bud.
  • What makes Watatu so compelling, as the film-loving public will hopefully see for themselves this weekend, is that the script itself has been carefully devised to convey authentic attitudes, ideas and frustrations felt by coastal youth, who like Salim are jobless, disillusioned and so hopeless they feel they have nothing to lose by joining the extremists who at least give them an outlet for their pent up rage and an ideology to believe it.

SAFE productions have never been shy about tackling thorny social topics in both their live performances and the films they subsequently produce.

Their plays have addressed everything from HIV/Aids, female genital mutilation (FGM) to corruption, post-election violence and most recently, the radicalization of Kenyan youth at the Coast in the film Watatu, which will premiere in Nairobi this coming Thursday evening at Prestige Plaza and run through the whole weekend, is the latest production by the production company.

Watatu is a daring attempt to examine one of the most troubling and timely issues affecting the entire Kenyan population today. It’s the issue of what turns good young people into terrorists prepared to sacrifice their lives—including all their dreams, ambitions and even their families — for a toxic, intolerant ideology that’s bent on revenge and destruction of all that doesn’t jive with their narrow fascistic beliefs.

The threesome that make up ‘watatu’ are Salim (played by Ali Mohamed Mlatso), a sweet, gentle young married Muslim man, Yusuf (played by Said Muhsin), Salim’s angry young relative who’s newly imbued with the hateful rage that characterizes the extremists, and Jack (Benson Obiva), the policeman who’s just moved back to Mombasa and coincidentally moved in next door to his long-lost friend Salim.

The actresses in Watatu also play important roles in the film, especially the two volatile mother-in-laws who each conveys her own set of antithetical stereotypes: Nana (Angie Magio), who despises "upcountry people" like Jack who she claims come to take all the land and lucrative jobs that the locals are entitled to; and Jack’s in-law Doreen (Carolyne Rita Mutua), who is deeply distrustful of Muslims who she claims want to "finish" all the Christians.

SUCCESSFUL TRANSLATION

Filmed entirely on location in Mombasa and devised by members of SAFE Pwani with support from the SAFE founding father, the award-winning British actor Nick Reding, Watatu also inspired input from the coastal communities who actually saw the story live and got a chance to not only respond to what they saw on stage, but also to express their views on what is to be done to nip the problem of youth radicalization in the bud.

Intent from the beginning to use the performing arts to rouse social awareness and affect fundamental social change among Kenyans, SAFE has been working the past 14 years to take their stories and original scripts straight to the grassroots.

And while the concept of taking theatre to the people isn’t something new — it was initiated back in the early 1970s by the late John Ruganda and the University of Nairobi’s Free Travelling Theatre — what has made SAFE productions unique is their successful translation of ingenious scripts into high-quality films like Ndoto za Elibidi, Nisisi.

What makes Watatu so compelling, as the film-loving public will hopefully see for themselves this weekend, is that the script itself has been carefully devised to convey authentic attitudes, ideas and frustrations felt by coastal youth, who like Salim are jobless, disillusioned and so hopeless they feel they have nothing to lose by joining the extremists who at least give them an outlet for their pent-up rage and an ideology to believe it.

Watatu is a gripping thriller which, according to Nick Reding, has tried to express a cross-section of genuine perspectives shared by a variety of coastal people. In other words, while the film grapples with one of the most highly politicized issues in Kenya today, it attempts to do so without bias towards one group or the other.

But ultimately, what gives Watatu the most fascinating feature of a locally made film is that the story doesn’t simply end with the consequences of the three men’s interconnected lives. Instead, the last segment of the film features shots of the original stage performance including audiences’ responses to the play. It also invites those same audiences to offer their own views of how to address and ideally solve the problem of the radicalization of Muslim youth at the Coast.

Watatu could be the most powerful and cutting-edge film of the three films that SAFE as thus far produced. See it for yourself this weekend and decide how you’d respond to the same complex questions posed to insightful audiences who saw the production live a few months ago.