In September 2012, a resident of Hout Bay, South Africa, awoke to the icy point of a screwdriver at his throat and glare of a torch in his eyes. Humiliated to be pulled naked from bed, he was repeatedly terrorised with the threat of instant murder if he did not fully comply and submit.
That victim of home invasion was Gordon Clark, a film director freshly returned from 26 years in Hollywood.
Some investigation in the ensuing days revealed that his story was not at all news-worthy – not even to the local rag! His tale was too mundane – every neighbour on all sides had been through similar.
The further he looked, the more-of-the-same he found – in every suburb across the country.
To air their plight and turn an urgent spotlight on the terror of it, Gordon resolved to give his neighbours the microphone to let them tell their story and put a human face on the bald statistics of home-invasion attacks that run with the monotonous repetitiveness of ticker-tape.
BehindParadiseTheMovie peels back the covers to illustrate what most of us don’t realize about our own environment – be that environment another suburb or farm community – until we too become victims of ambush.
This documentary exposes reality in a single ‘average’ suburb of South Africa:
– Every 3rd* night in just that small community, yet another family is assaulted; marauding gangs, sometimes military trained, burst in brandishing knives and guns.
* 143 “Robbery with aggravating circumstances” in 2013 – as indicated by official police statistics at:
http://www.crimestatssa.com/precinct.php?id=1081 – where the ‘Robbery with aggravating circumstances” category shows an unchecked rise from 2004, when 33 incidents occurred, until, 10 years later, a total of 813 individual victims or families in just this one suburb are now dealing with the terror of this dreadful experience.
Victims are routinely threatened with murder, terrified to their core, and stripped of their valuables, dignity and sleep for years to come. Their lives change forever.
Most suburbs suffer similarly – there is nowhere to flee to. Many emigrate.
Watch the trailer, share this message, and, when voting days come around, send your politicians a powerful message – remind them: “You are our servant – we pay the bills – protect us.”…
South Africa Today – South Africa News
