‘The Man With the Crooked Arm’ Creator Perivi Katjavivi on Using Genre to Revisit Germany’s Colonial Crimes in Africa
variety.comChristopher Vourlias “The Man With the Crooked Arm,” a Western drama series created by Perivi Katjavivi that was presented at the Berlinale Co-Production Market, is the latest attempt by the Namibian filmmaker to wrestle with the legacy of German colonialism in his southern African nation.
The eight-episode limited series follows a notorious Black cowboy who sets off on horseback across colonial-era Africa with stolen loot and an orphaned boy.
When a robbery goes awry, he has to decide whether he’ll protect the young orphan — whose father he just killed — or pursue his nemesis, a corrupt German missionary.
The series is based on the real-life Jonker Afrikaner, “a notorious figure, a bit of a badass — essentially, a cowboy and bandit who, along with his father, came into Namibia in the 1800s and caused chaos and transformed the place with the Bible and guns,” says Katjavivi, whose sophomore feature, “Under the Hanging Tree,” plays this week at the Joburg Film Festival.
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