Born of both a long-standing affection for the works of author Athol Fugard, upon whose novel this film is based, and an intimate familiarity with the shantytowns of his native South Africa, writer-director Gavin Hood’s Tsotsi is, when boiled down to its most basic elements, a coming-of-age story set in an extreme environment — and a searingly memorable one at that., a gang leader whose life takes a sharp turn in one moment when he shoots a woman and steals her car, only to discover a baby in the backseat. Perhaps even more unexpectedly, Tsotsi accepts responsibility for the child, and soon begins to rediscover a bit of the humanity he lost years ago as a child himself.<BR><BR><B>The title refers to a Zulu slang word for thug, but <I>Tsotsi</I> is driven by a robust and surging sense of basic human compassion that both eschews and runs counter to many of the clichés we’ve come to associate with ghetto movies</B> — even ones where our guide is a compromised hood acting not out of self-interest, a criminal with, in essence, a heart of, if not gold, then at least silver. Hood first scored work out of film school cranking out commissioned educational films for the South African government, and believe it or not, <B>this experience helps inform <I>Tsotsi</I>‘s lean and elegant style</B>, which presents its subjects matter-of-factly rather than impose a more overt directorial style.<BR><BR>The film’s DVD presentation is a nice one. Housed in a cardboard slipcover and an Amray case with snap-latches, <I>Tsotsi</I> is presented in a 2.35:1 widescreen transfer that preserves the aspect ratio of its theatrical exhibition, alongside a Dolby digital 5.1 surround sound audio track and subtitles in both English and Spanish. In addition to a feature-length audio-commentary track with Hood, there is also the writer-director’s commentary on a collection of deleted scenes, a further group of alternate endings and a 23-minute short film, <EM>The Storekeeper</EM>.<BR><BR>Ironically, the latter is perhaps most interesting, because of the manner in which it tells its story, free from dialogue. Hood discusses his inspiration for the 1998 short (it was based on the real-life story of a shop owner who rigged a rifle to protect his stockroom, which kept getting broken into) and talks about the project’s similarities and relationship to both <I>Tsotsi</I> and <I>A Reasonable Man</I>, which is the debut script that Hood finally directed in 1999. <B>While this commentary is a spoiler for those who haven’t yet seen either film, it — as much as Hood’s warm production reminiscences — paints a convincing picture of a new film humanist</B>. A brief making-of featurette and a music video rounds out <I>Tsotsi</I>‘s supplemental extras. <B>B+ (Movie) A- (Disc)</B></p>
<div class=)