S. Africa Seizes ‘Cry Freedom,’ Calling Film Dangerous

The movie “Cry Freedom” opened in more than 30 South African theaters Friday with the censor’s approval, but police said it threatened public safety and seized the copies seven hours later.

They cited two bombs, anonymous phone threats and violent scenes in the movie as proof that it is dangerous.

Moviegoers at the Northcliff Theater in a rich white Johannesburg suburb arrived to find posters being taken down and police ready to confiscate the film. “Cry Freedom” was replaced by “I Was A Teen-Age Vampire.”

Richard Attenborough, who directed the movie, said in London: “I never believed they would show it. . . . The overall reason for making the film was to tell people the truth about apartheid, and about how it struck both black and white South Africans.”

Nomphelo Ndabula, 19, emerged from a theater in tears. “I was nearly heartbroken,” she said. “The people, especially whites, must see the film. They will see that the black man must have rights. They will see that blacks are people.”

The Publication Appeals Board ruled Friday morning, for the second time, that the film could be shown. It said the movie, which depicts the death in detention in 1977 of young black-consciousness leader Steve Biko, was biased against police but did not endanger race relations or state security.

Gen. Hendrik de Witt, the police commissioner, declared in a statement Friday evening that the film “endangers the safety of the public, the maintenance of public order, and will delay the termination of the state of emergency” imposed on June 12, 1986.

Minister of Information Stoffel van der Merwe said the government decided to overrule the board because the censors could not judge “the situation on the streets.”

“The security forces are portrayed in such a negative light that their public image would be seriously undermined,” he said. “Whites are typified as privileged and surrounded by wealth, as opposed to blacks living in great poverty and subjected to exploitation and repression.”

Van der Merwe said those portrayals are not accurate.

South Africa’s apartheid system establishes a society in which the 26 million blacks have no voice in national affairs. The 5 million whites control the economy and maintain separate residential districts, schools, health services and recreation areas.

The movie, directed by Attenborough in neighboring Zimbabwe, is based on two books by Donald Woods, a white newspaper editor who befriended Biko and fled the country after Biko’s death.

Quotes Are Illegal

Woods is banned in South Africa, and it is illegal to quote him, as actor Kevin Kline does in portraying him, but De Witt did not mention that point in ordering the copies confiscated under emergency regulations.

Explosions, but no injuries, were reported at two theaters showing “Cry Freedom.” The blast at the Metro theater in downtown Durban occurred soon after police evacuated a multiracial crowd of 300; the other was at Kings Cinema in Alexandra, a black township outside Johannesburg.

Theaters in Port Elizabeth, Pretoria, Durban and in Soweto, the largest black township near Johannesburg, reported receiving anonymous bomb threats.

The censorship board approved the film without restrictions in November. It was to have opened in April but distributors withdrew it, asking for assurances that no one would be prosecuted for showing the film. The government made no promises.

Review Ordered

Stoffel Botha, home affairs minister, ordered the board last week to review its decision. The censors held a hearing Thursday and announced Friday morning that the movie could be shown with an age restriction of 19.

Showings began half an hour later.

Van der Merwe told a news conference the movie is intended as an anti-South Africa propaganda instrument. “We don’t need that sort of internal disturbance and excitement from people like Richard Attenborough,” he said.

Police reported threats and violence at one theater but did not identify it. There were no such reports of disturbances from journalists who joined audiences around the country.

Teens in Audience

“I don’t think people will go out and riot because it’s about events we all know about,” said a black youth at the Kine Theater in Johannesburg. He would not give his name.

The audience of 200, most of them black teen-agers, jumped forward in their seats and hissed during the scene at the end in which white policemen open fire on marching Soweto schoolchildren in 1976.

Sobs also could be heard. People sat with hands in front of their mouths. The hissing grew when the camera showed patches of blood on the children’s crisp, white school shirts.

Several blacks sang softly along with the sound track of “God Bless Africa,” which many blacks consider to be their national anthem.

It ends with the shout, “Amandla!” --the Zulu word for power. Many viewers joined the shout, then the audience filed out without waiting for the credits.