Aids orphans who made it together

Published on Sunday 3 August 2008 19:23

TV review

We Are Together, Channel 4, Saturday

Passage – The John Rae Story, BBC2, Sunday

WHAT is Agape? Let 12-year-old Slindile explain: "It's a place where children live … for beautiful children!" She giggled. "OK, it's a place for children where … oh no … it's a place for children who don't have parents." But she was right first time, because We Are Together – an intensely moving film about the Agape Children's Home for Aids orphans in South Africa – did indeed feature beautiful children, singing beautifully.

The orphanage, run by a large lady called "Grandma" Zodwa, offers the children "unconditional love", sends them to school and teaches them music. Slindile Moya and four of her siblings went there after their parents died; three older siblings live at home, unable to earn enough to feed them, but it was clear they were still very close. In fact, they had a song about it, which went "We are together, we are a family," a haunting, odd little refrain which echoed through young filmmaker Paul Taylor's documentary.

There was great sadness in it. The Moyas' eldest brother, Sifiso, lay sick as his younger siblings visited, trying to join in with a song. His illness turned out to be, of course, Aids. "You know what, don't cry for me," he told his weeping sisters, "you are breaking my heart."

But there were more joyful moments too, such as the playful little brother and the visit from a local pop star, Zwai Bala, to sing with them. Slindile did her hair a special way that day – but not for him, you understand, she insisted cutely. Despite their difficult lives, they are still children who get restless singing for long periods.

There was a plan to take their choir to Britain, where the children had heard you can travel underground, there are no monkeys and they'd get nice food on the plane (hey, two out of three ain't bad). They practised and practised but it fell through.

Instead, the Moya children sang at Sifiso's funeral. Then the Agape Home burnt down – a faulty plug destroyed everything they had in less than an hour, says "Grandma", leaving them crammed into a temporary shelter. By this point in this film, I was in bits; it seemed a blow too much for these charming, talented, cheerful children to bear.

But they did: structured almost like an inspirational movie (maybe it will be one some day), the children overcame. The CD that they had made became a hit in the United States; they got to go to New York, make a snowman, meet Alicia Keys and perform with Paul Simon. And they raised enough money to rebuild the home.

It's a wonderful happy ending to the film, which was sensitively told with extraordinary access to this particular family. Having won the audience award at the Edinburgh Film Festival last year, it's good that a wider public have now had a chance to see their story and hear their gorgeous music. But while it left these children set for a brighter future, it was such a narrow victory that you couldn't help feeling worried for all the others like them.

Passage: The John Rae Story had a great story too, about the Orkney doctor and Arctic explorer who solved the mystery of the Northwest Passage. But this peculiar international co-production did a poor job explaining his importance, cluttering things up with too much footage of the team researching a dramatised version.

Half the time we saw only the rehearsal version of scenes, frustratingly, while the actor playing him footered around learning about Rae's upbringing in Orphir. Part two is this Sunday, when hopefully they will finally get to the actual exciting bit.