Calvinia review – jarringly nostalgic look at a South African childhood | Film
Situated in the Northern Cape province of South Africa, Calvinia is a rural town blessed with a magnificently scenic landscape, where towering mountain ranges give way to far-reaching plains. It is also the birthplace of film-maker Rudivan der Merwe, whose documentary ode, with its triptych structure guided by childhood memories, is both a pilgrimage and farewell to his home town.Van der Merwe first fixes his camera on his parents, who were livestock ranchers. In contrast to the supposed quaintness of farm life, the…