Harsh Sun
Running Time: Feature Film
Writer/Director: Amie Williams
Story Editor: Marguerite Pigott
Producer(s): Trish Dolman
Grace is like any other teenage girl, trying to find her voice in the world, but when your world is AIDS ravaged Africa, you learn to speak even louder.
Grace Adwek is a young girl with a mission. On her own in the world with no family, she dreams of one day becoming a writer. Leaving behind her friends at the tea plantation where she and her mother worked, Grace moves to the city for a new tutoring job. Her strong work ethic and feisty disposition impress her boss, Daudi, an “educated abroad” Kenyan, torn between his loyalties to his country and the corruption surrounding him. But when his frustration releases itself, he rapes Grace, forcing her into the streets of Nairobi with no money.
Navigating the gridlock and pulse of the slum, Grace makes several friends, including Surfer Girl and her pack of ‘Chokoro’, (charcoal) street kids who live off the profits from recycling choice finds from the city’s sprawling dump. She is drawn to Tonza, an easy-going and flirtatious 19 year-old bus driver who introduces Grace to his sister Rose, a prostitute. Together, Grace, Tonza, Rose and Nozwe, a two year-old orphan infected with HIV, improvise a makeshift family, helping each other out.
Nozwe’s disease progresses rapidly and despite honorable attempts of medical assistance by Joanna, a British AIDS researcher, Nozwe dies. Deeply concerned for Rose’s welfare, Grace convinces Rose to participate in Joanna’s vaccine study, in exchange for any medical coverage she may need. Grace is relieved to hear that Rose has inexplicably managed to show immunity to the rampant HIV virus, but her world caves in when Grace finds out she is HIV positive.
After going through what seems insurmountable hardship, Grace is forced to make a choice: will she become one of the countless, faceless, forgotten victims, or will she stand up and speak out? More than anything, she learns to overcome her fear of being rejected, learning that her greatest gift is to allow herself to be human, to be loved.
Jua Kali (Harsh Sun) is a stark and moving example of the reality facing over 25 million AIDS orphans in Africa today, as Grace learns to find her voice in a world where she would normally be silenced.