GOD'S WORK SELECTED FOR THE 29TH ZANZIBAR INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL
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Acclaimed South African Feature Continues International Festival Journey Following Luxor Award Recognition.
Durban, South Africa: The South African feature film God's Work, written and directed by Michael James and produced by Sithabile Mkhize, has been officially selected for the 29th Zanzibar International Film Festival (ZIFF), taking place in Zanzibar, Tanzania, from 24–28 June 2026.
Widely regarded as one of Africa's most influential cultural and cinematic events, ZIFF brings together filmmakers, artists, scholars and audiences from across the continent and beyond. The 2026 edition is presented under the theme "AI and the Art of Storytelling", exploring questions of authorship, representation, creative ownership and the future of narrative practice.
The selection marks another significant milestone in the international journey of God's Work, following its recent recognition at the Luxor African Film Festival in Egypt, where the film received the prestigious Radwan El Kashef Prize for Best Film Addressing an African Issue.
Set in a crumbling safehouse in Durban, God's Work follows a group of unhoused men navigating addiction, poverty, violence and fragile brotherhood on society's margins. When a film crew arrives to document their lives, the promise of visibility begins to unravel the boundaries between reality and performance. What begins as observation gradually transforms into a confrontation with the act of representation itself, exposing the uneasy relationship between those who are seen and those who do the seeing.
Blending fiction, documentary, memory and hallucination, the film challenges long-held assumptions about the camera as a neutral observer. Rather than offering a definitive account of life on the margins, God's Work interrogates the processes through which stories are constructed, mediated and understood.
Director Michael James said:
"ZIFF has long been one of the continent's most important spaces for African cinema and critical engagement, making this selection especially meaningful. God's Work emerged from my own attempt to document a community during the COVID-19 lockdown, only to discover the limitations of that approach. The film ultimately became less about documenting lives and more about examining the distance between observer and observed. We are honoured to bring these conversations to ZIFF and to engage with audiences from across Africa around questions of storytelling, representation and responsibility."
Producer Sithabile Mkhize added: "At its heart, God's Work is a film about visibility, but not in the conventional sense. It asks difficult questions about who has the power to tell stories, how those stories are shaped, and what happens when the people being represented begin to challenge the terms of that representation. We are deeply grateful to ZIFF for recognising a work that seeks not to provide easy answers but to create space for reflection and dialogue."
Executive Producer Toni Monty commented: "The selection of God's Work for ZIFF is particularly significant because the film speaks directly to contemporary conversations about storytelling, authorship and perspective. While rooted in a specific South African context, the film raises universal questions about empathy, representation and the ethics of looking. As African cinema continues to evolve and expand its global presence, festivals such as ZIFF play a vital role in creating space for these critical conversations."
Produced by Sithabile Mkhize, co-produced by Marco Orsini, and executive produced by Toni Monty and Gary Springer, God's Work is a Maverick Resistance production in association with the KwaZulu-Natal Film and Tourism Authority, the National Film and Video Foundation of South Africa, Amafrika Films and Mojo Entertainment LLC, with support from the Durban Film Office.
As God's Work continues its international festival journey, its inclusion in ZIFF further establishes the film as a bold contribution to contemporary African cinema that challenges audiences to reconsider not only what they see on screenbut also the assumptions that shape how they see it.
MEDIA CONTACTS
South Africa / African Publicity:
Sharlene Versfeld
International Publicity:
Gary Springer
Festival, Sales and Distribution Enquiries:
Riaya Aboul
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