Normally, I am reluctant to slam another person's comments about a film, but I have to take issue with Noel-74. First of all, the arrogance of comments like, "You've got to be a complete idiot to believe you're seeing something new" takes me back to the self-important little twerps of my undergraduate days. So, Noel-74, if you are an undergraduate, my apologies. Let's hope it's just a stage you're working through. If you're over the of 25, please stay clear. I mean, seriously, your comment that there was something sinister in making abject poverty look so beautiful. Can any person look at the scenes depicted in that movie and feel anything other than horror at the conditions in which so many of our brothers and sisters live? Not to get all touchy-feely on you, but if you came away from that movie thinking about how beautiful it all looked, I'd say it was you, and not the movie, that could use a little more introspection. I liked this movie a lot. I thought it was moving, chilling, depressing and unpredictable. Even the ending (NO SPOILERS HERE) could have gone a bunch of different ways, several of which would have been more conventional than what we are left with. A very good film, with excellent acting.

The ugliness and squalor of Soweto stands in sharp contrast against the glass and concrete modern buildings of downtown Johannesburg. The disparity is captured by Gavin Hood and his cinematographer Lance Gewer in "Tsotsi". The film is based on an Athol Fugard novel we haven't read, but having seen most of his important plays, it follows this writer's vision about his homeland.

Tsotsi is a product of the slums. His father is a cruel man who doesn't even allow the young boy to be near his dying mother. She appears to be an AIDS victim, and, in her husband's ignorance he believes it's contagious. Tsotsi grows up fending for himself and the result is a predator who will do anything in order to survive.

This young man enters a life of crime, as witnessed in the opening scenes on the packed train where Tsotsi and his gang surrounds a victim that happens to have displayed his money in public. For the next victim, Tsotsi chooses a woman who is returning home. After shooting her, he takes her car, only to discover later on a young infant has been riding in the back seat.

That boy will be the only way this petty criminal's soul would soften as he begins a bonding with the baby. As he gets frustrated with the care of the infant, he decides to follow a young woman, the mother of a toddler; Tsotsi knows she has the milk the baby needs for nourishment. Miriam, who realizes Tsotsi is the man being hunted by the authorities asks him to let her keep and take care of the baby, but even this hard thug can't part with the baby, who has awakened in him a tender side of his character.

The film shows a good director, Gavin Hood, under control. Mr. Hood got excellent performances all around. Presley Chweneyagae makes an impression as the title character in the movie. Mathusi Magano, is Boston, the man Tsotsi beats savagely, after he crosses him. Terry Pheto is also memorable as the young Miriam, a woman who has lost her own husband to thugs roaming the slums where they live.

Another great asset is the background music heard in the film. It enhances the movie as interpreted by Zola, who also plays Fela, the rival boss of another gang.

At times, "Tsotsi" is hard to sit through because of the violence one sees. For a film from South Africa, this film comes as a surprise because it feels true from beginning to end, thanks to the excellent work of Gavin Hood.

In the slums of Johannesburg, Tsotsi is the ruthless leader of his small gang of Butcher, Aap and Boston. Butcher kills an old man during a mugging. Boston starts questioning Tsotsi's brutality and Tsotsi beats him up. Tsotsi shoots a woman during a carjacking and finds a baby in the backseat. He takes the baby back home to the slums.

The lead Presley Chweneyagae is an amateur actor. I'm fine with him at the beginning, and I love the location. In the end, I don't think he's hard enough. I imagine Tsotsi would be more fun as a big hard guy trying to take care of a little baby. He's more of a little guy. He does have a little psycho edge to him but he could be crazier. Evenutally the amateur acting fails to raise the movie to the next level.