Last Grave at Dimbaza is a 1974 documentary film made by South African expatriates and British film students who wanted to document Apartheid in South Africa. Because of South Africa's restrictive laws governing what could be photographed, the film had to be shot clandestinely and smuggled out of the country, where it was edited and released in England.
The film highlighted the disparity in living conditions between white and black people in South Africa, revealing that this has been enshrined in numerous South African laws. While white people enjoyed one of the highest standards of living in the world, the lives of black people were carefully circumscribed so that they enjoyed few rights with no legal recourse. Most lived in poverty.
The closing scene of the film was photographed in a black children's cemetery in the town Dimbaza. Because of the high mortality rate, the film shows graves that have already been dug in anticipation of the newly deceased. The final words of the narrator are:
"During the hour you've been watching this film, six black families have been thrown out of their homes, sixty blacks have been arrested under the pass laws, and sixty black children have died of the effects of malnutrition. And during the same hour, the gold mining companies have made a profit of £35,000."
I found apartheid inhumane and abhorrent and voted with my feet when I left South Africa again in early 1969. Has anything changed? Colour apartheid has been abolished but the economic apartheid continues.
