Black Coffee teams up with Spike Lee for SA animated film

South African DJ Black Coffee has joined forces with legendary American filmmaker Spike Lee for an ambitious animated short film celebrating the power of friendship across racial divides.

Titled APART, the film revisits one of the darkest chapters in South Africa’s history through the unlikely friendship of two young boys growing up during apartheid.

The high-profile creative collaboration brings together some of the biggest names in international and South African arts.

Lee, renowned for films tackling race and social injustice, is part of the film’s writing team. Black Coffee, meanwhile, serves as music supervisor, shaping the film’s sonic identity.

They are joined by acclaimed South African fashion designer Laduma Ngxokolo, whose Maxhosa Designs label has gained international recognition.

At the helm is South African director Pola Maneli, whose work has featured on the cover of The New Yorker and in the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture.

Black Coffee and Spike Lee bring star power to film

The film’s story has its roots in a real-life friendship formed at a bus stop in Bluewater Bay in Port Elizabeth during the 1990s.

Two young boys, Joel and Themba, bonded over football despite the racial divisions of apartheid-era South Africa.

Three decades later, their story has inspired APART, which explores how their friendship survives in a society determined to keep them apart.

The film’s creators describe it as a story about “our capacity for empathy, courage and connection.”

It also makes a deliberate statement about the role of human creativity in filmmaking. Not a single frame was created using artificial intelligence (AI).

Instead, the production combines four animation techniques, including traditional 2D, cut-out animation, 3D and 2.5D.

APART makes its way home to South Africa

The animated short has already attracted international attention.

Following its global premiere at New York’s Tribeca Festival, the production featured in several film festival selections across North America.

It has also entered the Oscars conversation, fuelling speculation about its awards prospects.

The film has already made its African premiere at the Fame Shorts Film Festival during FAME Week Africa in Cape Town.

For a production bringing together internationally recognised creative talents, APART’s South African story remains firmly at its heart.