Dan Slevin says that The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind is a rare modern family movie that's actually about something.
William Kamkwamba (Maxwell Simba) and his father Trywell (Chiwetel Ejiofor) and the bike that will prove important later on in The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind. Photo: Netflix
In 2006, the village of Wimbe (and others) in rural Malawi experienced in turn, a poor harvest, a catastrophic flood and a famine, exacerbated (in fact, caused) by corporate exploitation and local corruption. William Kamkwamba, teenage son of a poor local farmer, forced to drop out of school because his family can’t afford the fees, sneaks his way into the school library to continue his autodidactic explorations into the world of electrical engineering and learns how to build a wind turbine from an old bicycle and other scrap that will pump water from the well and save the village.
It’s a true story and it made William famous. Not long after these exploits, he was blogged about, TED-talked about and Wall Street Journal’d about. A documentary called William and the Windmill won the Grand Jury Prize at South By South West in 2013.
Now, there’s a feature film and it fills a rare niche these days – a genuine family film about something important. The film is called The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind and it was made for the BBC but quickly snapped up by Netflix for (almost) the rest of the world including New Zealand. Written and directed by the gifted actor Chiwetel Ejiofor, it’s a rewarding drama for audiences of, I’d guess, 12 and over – provided the youngest are happy with reading subtitles for half a film.
Photo: Netflix
I liked that it emphasised that the farmers of this region were hard-working and had been successful until global tobacco suppliers moved production to Mozambique. They were then forced to sell the trees that kept them safe from flooding – at lower-than-market values – and their government failed to heed the warnings and stockpile enough grain to see them through.
But it is William Kamkwamba’s story and he is very winningly played by Kenyan first-timer Maxwell Simba. From repairing a radio so farm workers can listen to a football match to scouring the local dump for spare parts that he can turn into a windmill, the determination and character is etched on to the young man’s face – especially when he has to go against the wishes of his struggling father (played by Ejiofor himself).
Photo: Netflix
My only qualm about this film is that all of the above-the-line roles (in front of and behind the camera) are performed by imported professionals – BBC veterans, Brits, Italians, Brazilians – rather than Africans but the locations are bang on. The village of Wimbe plays the village of Wimbe perfectly.
The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind is streaming exclusively on Netflix.
