Reconciliation on the River

A culture clash becomes a triumph in a new South African film.

- Bruce Dennill

Piers Cruickshanks is a 10-time Dusi Canoe Marathon gold medallist and the author of Confluence: Beyond The River with Siseko Ntondini, the story of his partnership with Soweto Canoe And Recreation Club paddler Siseko Ntondini, with whom he partnered in the 2014 Dusi, coming seventh and inspiring the new Heartlines film Beyond The River, out this month.

The film is understandably dramatised for effect, but it shows Siseko as coming from a really tough background, with canoeing offering him a way to something better. And it shows you – or ‘Steve’, the character standing in for you in the story – as a fairly tetchy sort ...

The character of Duma in the film is an amalgamation of Siseko and another guy named Sifiso, who, while they may have been naughty, were not thieves like the characters in the film. Siseko is now studying law, so he’s the kind of a guy with a good sense of right and wrong.

He’s become a bit of a hero in his community, and he now needs to keep performing to keep that narrative going. But he also has to work hard at his job and finish his law degree, and he has some good people helping him with those goals.

Steve is definitely not me, though I get teased a lot by the guys at the canoe club about being so sour, and some people even come and commiserate about the character’s struggles onscreen.