She Saw the Sea: A marine biologist in South Africa

by Beckypublished on 8th June 2022

Kholofelo Sethebe was first drawn to the sea as a child, on a visit to Cape Town from her landlocked home province in South Africa. But traditional fears of the ocean were deep, so it is only now, as a qualified marine biologist, that she is teaching herself to swim.

She Saw the Sea, an uplifting film by Karin Slater, follows the vivacious Kholofelo as she braves the ocean to find a beautiful new underwater world.

Karin Slater is a South African director and cinematographer, with more than 30 years of experience. Her films have been shown by international broadcasters and at major festivals. She has won many awards, including at Mipdoc and the Innovative Film Festival in Switzerland. She specialises in wildlife filmmaking and is a judging member of the Academy (Oscars).

Up Next

land-or-death
In this documentary from Al Jazeera we discover how an Indigenous grandmother combats Colombia’s most dangerous armed groups.
med-hondo-african-cinema
French children recognise Hondo as the voice of Donkey in Shrek. But to a generation of cinema-goers, Hondo was a radical filmmaker who used his creativity as a tool to fight injustice, wherever he saw it.
Featured
diamonds_in_the_dirt
This is the story of some of Baton Rouge's most successful rappers; their struggle and survival in one of the deadliest cities in America.
Featured
the_o_briens
After the death of his wife, an Irish father summons his sons and his daughter to the family farm in Galway causing all to fear the worst, but he is not the only one with a secret… "I laughed, I cried, and I remembered how great it is to be Irish." (Mail on Sunday)
desert-scribe-mali
Timbuktu is renowned for its ancient texts, which date back to when the Malian city was a vital scholastic centre over 500 years ago. Boubacar Saddeck Najim is one of the few remaining copyists who painstakingly replicates these precious manuscripts for posterity.
firewoman
Tarren-Lynn January is part of the Juliet Crew, the only all-female bush firefighting unit in Cape Town, South Africa. She and her teammates were recruited to encourage more women into firefighting. In this documentary we bunker down with the crew at their barracks on the Western Cape mountains.