Eyes on Oscars for Boniface Mwangi’s feature film Softie
Kenyan feature film Softie has been the talk of the town, especially after qualifying for considerations in next year’s Academy awards, writes Faith Kyoumukama
To many, Boniface Mwangi is just a photojournalist-turned-political activist, while to others he is a husband, father, friend and brother.
And he is no stranger to the Kenyan public. He is particularly remembered for the ‘MPigs’ protest outside parliament in May 2013 in Nairobi that consisted of pigs smeared in blood to portray the Members of Parliament as greedy.
His personal life and struggle in political activism has since been covered in the recently released 90-minute feature film dubbed Softie.
According to the film’s director Sam Soko, the original idea was to make a short video that could be used as a training tool.
“The idea was to just film an activist, and put it up on YouTube. And at the time, Boniface was the “activist”.
It was around 2015 following a protest that went left; Boni was beaten up badly and we were filming him.
Back home, his eldest son wanted him to help with the homework, and the more we continued filming that side of his personal life, we realised that there was that story that needs to be told and it couldn’t be done in a 30-minute video,” he said.
In one of the scenes filmed at his home, his child asks him where he’s going and Mwangi bluntly answers, “I’m going to topple the government.” 
In another online interview hosted by the Nairobi Film Fest, Mwangi’s wife Njeri Mwangi revealed that he was against the idea of Soko filming their personal life, and that it should have stuck to his activism work.
“I struggled with the idea for a moment, but when he explained why it’s important to tell the story.
He said it represents the likes of us who never get such an opportunity to share what we do in the background.”
The making
Softie begins with showing that infamous protest of 2013, where Mwangi is seen getting the pigs and the chaos that follows when the police inexorably appeared and started to lob teargas and beat up the protesters.
The title of the documentary is a sheng word used when referring to a weakling or ‘soft’ person.
Growing up, Mwangi was mocked by his peers for being a softie, which is quite to the contrast to the man he has grown up to be.
He was raised by a single mother in the sprawling Mathare slums in Nairobi. In the film, he takes his family to see the house that he spent most of his childhood years in.
He grew up in poverty, an experience that affected his viewpoint in general, especially when it comes to politics and the poor populace.
He later got into journalism and he was covering the on goings at the height of the post-general election violence in 2007 as a photojournalist.
When he took the ‘disturbing pictures’ to his editor who then refused to publish them, he went ahead to exhibit them publicly in their real form.
Depicting a life-changing moment for him that seamlessly contributes to Mwangi’s fearless drive of activism, the film also takes us through the 2017 election campaign where he vied for the Starehe Constituency parliamentry seat.
Due to the threats from his political rivals, he saw it right that his wife and their three children run to the USA for safety.
They stayed there for eight months, while Mwangi tried to run a ‘clean campaign’ instead of the usual norm where bribery is normally the order of the day and unfortunately, he lost the election.
Mwangi shares that before working with Soko, somebody had approached him to have his story filmed, but the two parties failed to agree on certain things.
He says that Soko has become more than just a workmate, but a family friend.
When asked if he ever wonders whether all the struggles and emotional turmoil that has come with his activism was worth it, Mwangi says: “When it’s happening, it doesn’t feel so, but when you look at the fruits, yes, it’s worth it; you have to see the bigger picture. It’s a sacrifice.
When I think a lot about what my wife has actually gone through, I feel bad, but it’s a struggle and there is a price that has to be paid, and along the way there are casualties.”
Big moves
Softie premiered in a competition at Sundance Film Festival (SFF), where it won a prize for editing. SFF is an annual film festival organised by the Sundance Institute.
It takes place in Park City, Utah in USA, and at the Sundance Resort (a year-round luxury mountain resort dedication to conservation, the arts, and community), and is the largest independent film festival in the United States.
The film has also played at a couple of festivals including Copenhagen International Documentary Festival and Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival—the largest documentary festival in North America.
It also received a digital release in the US last week with American’s Public Broadcasting Service’s documentary outlet Point-of-View
Softie also won Best Film award at the Encounters International Documentary Festival and Best Documentary at the Durban International Film Festival (DIFF) 2020 in South Africa.
The DIFF win means that Softie now qualifies for consideration for the Oscar documentary shortlist for the 93rd Academy Awards ceremony in 2021.
