Documentary Films

N!ai, The Story of a !Kung Woman


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From the !Kung series
by John Marshall and Adrienne Miesmer
Michael Ambrosino, Executive Producer, PBS (study guide available)
color, 59 min, 1980



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This film provides a broad overview of Ju/'hoan life, both past and present, and an intimate portrait of N!ai, a Ju/'hoan woman who in 1978 was in her mid-thirties. N!ai tells her own story, and in so doing, the story of Ju/'hoan life over a thirty year period.

"Before the white people came we did what we wanted," N!ai recalls, describing the life she remembers as a child: following her mother to pick berries, roots, and nuts as the season changed; the division of giraffe meat; the kinds of rain; her resistance to her marriage to /Gunda at the age of eight; and her changing feelings about her husband when he becomes a healer. As N!ai speaks, the film presents scenes from the 1950's that show her as a young girl and a young wife.

The uniqueness of N!ai may lie in its tight integration of ethnography and history. While it portrays the changes in Ju/'hoan society over thirty years, it never loses sight of the individual, N!ai.

Film Festivals, Screenings, Awards
CINE Golden Eagle
American Film Festival Blue Ribbon
Cinema du Reel, Grand Prize
International Film & Television Festival, NY, Best Television Documentary
International News Coverage Festival, Grand Prize
RAI, Highest Film Commendation

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