London film fest bangs the Drum

With a wealth of films on offer at the LFF, we very nearly tore ourselves in several parts trying to get to all of them, but finally settled on staying in one piece and attending South African film Drum, from director Zola Maseko and starring Taye Diggs and Jason Flemyng.

Flemyng himself was in attendance, so we asked him to tell us a little about the film and his involvement in it.

"It’s set at the time of the clearances in South Africa, in Sophiatown, which was a borough of Johannesburg. There was a magazine called Drum, which was like the mouthpiece of the ANC during the 50s and 60s, and was kind of ignored by the government at the time. I play Jim Bailey, the guy who owns the newspaper. It's about what happened to the journalists of that newspaper at that time, and the very first beginnings of Mandela' rise to prominence."

The film shot on location in South Africa, which meant that Flemyng's gangster movie past came in handy. "It's not unlike South London but it's certainly a place that I'll never forget."