GERRIE AND LOUISE (TV)
Summary
This documentary, a 1997 International Emmy Award winner, focuses on the relationship between Colonel Gerrie Hugo and investigative journalist Louise Flanagan, both of whom live in South Africa and once held radically different views on apartheid. This program includes interviews with and comments by the following individuals: Bishop Desmond Tutu, anti-apartheid crusader Custa Jack, and Colonel Yan Anton Mugolt, who discuss the following topics, among others: how Louise Flanagan risked her life trying to abolish the government hit squads in South Africa; Gerrie Hugo's role as one of the commanders of a hit squad; why the two decided to get married; whether Flanagan feels that her husband has completely changed his life; her admiration for his courage in risking his own life to get out of the military and renounce the practices of the hit squads; Bishop Tutu's desire that hit squad members confess their crimes before the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in return for forgiveness and amnesty; why Flanagan was asked to work as an investigator for the Commission to track down hit squad members; the reasons Hugo broke military rank and spoke out against the system he once believed in; his family's history in the military; what it felt like to kill a man during the 1975 covert wars with Angolia; interrogation tactics he was taught during his military days; how he became a member of a hit squad which was designated to permanently eliminate many members of the African National Congress (ANC), such as Custa Jack; Hugo's command of a covert operation, dubbed Orpheus, that targeted ANC members while they slept; the danger involved in the hit squads venturing into townships in the middle of the night; how some of the bodies that were found by the ANC were so badly tortured that they were unrecognizable; why Flanagan's work on the hit squads landed her in a detention center; personal problems associated with Colonel Hugo's work in the military; his belief that the covert operations would wind down after Nelson Mandela was released from prison after twenty-six years; why he left the South African military to join the Ciskei as their chief of intelligence; Colonel Mugolt's covert mission after Colonel Hugo had left the hit squads; Flanagan's investigation of Mugolt and the Ciskei's operations; Hugo's fear he was going to be killed; his determination to save his life by discussing the hit squads at a press conference; Flanagan's decision to publish the story that Hugo told; how Hugo's life was turned upside down after the press conference; why he had no other choice than to turn for help to his father, who was forced to choose between his own son and his strong political beliefs; how Flanagan found Hugo alone in an empty house drinking his life away; their realization that they needed each other for personal and professional reasons; why they went looking for Mugolt; Flanagan's surprise at receiving a phone call from Hugo, who was on the run, following the 1992 massacre at Bisho during an ANC march she was covering; how long it took for her to discover a different side of Hugo that nobody had ever seen; why Hugo became a media darling after he publicly spoke out about the inhumane practices of the hit squads; how Flanagan's efforts helped shut down the government's covert operations forever; Hugo's personal apologies to Custa Jack; and why he cannot get another job in the military or with the government even after the establishment has been banished.
(Contains adult-oriented language.)
(This program is the winner of the 1997 International Emmy Award for documentary.)
Details
- NETWORK: N/A
- DATE: November 30, 1996
- RUNNING TIME: 1:15:05
- COLOR/B&W: Color
- CATALOG ID: T:51261
- GENRE: Public affairs/Documentaries
- SUBJECT HEADING: Apartheid; South Africa
- SERIES RUN: N/A
- COMMERCIALS: N/A
CREDITS
- Mark Starowicz … Executive Producer
- Phyllis Brown … Producer
- David York … Producer
- Sturla Gunnarsson … Producer, Director
- Steven Silver … Co-Producer, Writer
- Barry Stevens … Writer
- Jonathan Goldsmith … Music by
- Warrick Sony … Music by
- Sturla Gunnarsson … Narrator
- Louise Flanagan
- Gerrie Hugo
- Custa Jack
- Nelson Mandela
- Yan Anton Mugolt
- Desmond Tutu