'Amandla! A Revolution in Four-Part Harmony'
High notes

WHEN WESTERN ARTISTS such as Paul Simon and Peter Gabriel began incorporating African musical strains into their work in the '80s, the uncomfortable question arose as to where the line between exposing a rich source of expression and exploiting it for personal gain lies. It wasn't long before the continent's sounds went from a world music aficionado's find to baby-boomer appropriation, mutating into an exotic curio of the week perfect for selling cars and breakfast cereal to the masses. Initially, the thought of a documentary charting African music of the last half century seemed like another round of the cultural-commodity shell game. Filmmaker Lee Hirsch's feature-length labor of love, however, quickly dispels any notion of simply celebrating brass-heavy polyrhythms for the armchair tourist; Amandla!, which means "power," reclaims the music by providing a context for the laments, dirges, and protest songs that fueled black South Africa's 50-year struggle. As much a history of the nation's apartheid-to-African National Congress era, the film looks back on the days when singing something like "Beware, Verwoerd" (referencing then-prime minister Hendrik Verwoerd) was the only way to voice defiance of the white government's systematic oppression, and the ultimate revolutionary act was to triumphantly trill it on your way to the gallows. Actual performances only appear sporadically, but when they do, often as impromptu remembrances of those days of rage by musicians and freedom fighters alike, the footage of beatings and tyranny that bookends them gives the music an amazing weight. There may be little in the way of the movie's form that seems groundbreaking (standard talking-head interviews, newsreel clips, snippets of concerts and rallies), but in terms of a new musicology, Amandla! almost feels like a new day dawning. (David Fear)