I'm told that there are some cultures which regard living through interesting times as a curse. What would happen to drama if times were uninteresting. Meet Molly Roth (Jodhi May). She's a normal teenager in a regimented society. It's 1963 in South Africa. Her parents are involved in the anti-apartheid cause. Her father flees the country. The police pick up her mother.

It is a partially valid criticism offered by another commentator that the film does not explain why the Roths oppose apartheid. Yet A World Apart entirely approaches the weighty issues from 13 year old Molly Roth's perspective. There are limitations in the view of a 13 year old born into an existing system. Yet the film graphically presents valid reasons. Before Molly must witness her mother's arrest, she watches from her friend's mother's car as no one rush up to aid the victim of a hit and run driver and as the police take no interest in pursuing the offender.

The film is superior in the mid 1960s costumes, hair styles, downtown areas in English speaking cities, and automobiles.

David Suchet renders a bravura performance as the vicious police detective Muller. He would play a similar part as the KGB Agent in The Falcon and The Snow Man.

The first dramatic feature directed by Oscar-winning cinematographer Chris Menges tackles the injustices of Apartheid, without trivializing the issues or compromising the dramatic integrity of its script. Instead of adopting a gratuitous high moral tone, Menges concentrates first on telling a good story, following the growth to maturity of an adolescent (white) girl, already racially color blind, who feels neglected by her journalist/activist mother. The film might be criticized for once again using white protagonists to educate audiences about the black experience in South Africa, but it's a hollow complaint: writer Shawn Slovo based her script on personal experience, and the depth of its detail reflects her crystal-clear memories of growing up in Johannesburg during the early 1960s.

That the film succeeds more on a personal level in no way diminishes its political message, which unlike other anti-Apartheid dramas is never force-fed in condescending spoonfuls ("I know that already; stop treating me like a baby!" cries the frustrated young heroine after yet another lecture from mom). No easy solutions are offered, and the film ends in just another riot, suggesting with cautious optimism the hope for ultimate victory after what promises to be a long and difficult struggle.

If this is indicative of things to come, Jodhi May will be one strong actress to reckon with. Barbara Hershey has never been better, but Jodhi May steals the show as her neglected daughter struggling with terms of identity and growth in South Africa pre-Apartheid. This one is truly a gem. I highly recommend seeing it at any opportunity. I have a copy of it I taped off the television years and years ago. I'm hoping one day it is released on DVD.