Burnt Onion Production presents Busi Lurayi (Tumi Sello) Thuli Thabethe, Yonda Thomas (Khaya Manqele), Thando Thabethe (Beauty Sello), Clementine Mosemane (Dineo Sello) Motlatsi Mashi (Themba Twala) Trevor Gumbi (Siya Twala), Valencia Twala (Germaine Minta), Keketso Semoko (Aunt Moipone) Sandile Mahlangu (Sibusisu Twala), Mandla Swankie Nafoko (Lydia Twala), Warren Masem…Rami Chuene (Aunt Grace), Tumi Masem…Minnie DlaminiJulius Malema. Vusi Twala (Saint Seseli) Nande Nyembe (Gogo Twala), Desmond Dube (Uncle Shadrack). ©2020
This year, a deluge of Christmas films comes our way. Naija Christmas (2021), Holiday Rush (2019), Operation Christmas Drop (2020), Falling for Christmas (2022), Christmas on Mistletoe Farm (2022), A Castle for Christmas (2021), A Bad Mom’s Christmas (2017), And How to Ruin Christmas. How to ruin…has been on my radar since last year’s Christmas. An excellent title for the season (Christmas), but the fact that it comes as a serial production, which I do not favor for my reviews, I had given it a cold shoulder. But I decided to check in on this title because it struck a cord at an interesting African religious aspect of burials. In its 3 seasons and 10 episodes, Burnt Out Production gives us a well-rounded story.
“And look, an angel of the Lord stood by them. And the glory of the Lord shone around them. They were terrified.” The angel said to them, “Do not be afraid, for see, I bring you good news of great joy which will be to all the people. This day, there is born to you in the city of David, a Savior, the Messiah, the Lord. This is the sign: you will find a baby wrapped up in stripped of cloth, lying in a feeding trough.” That is the Biblical proclamation based on why we celebrate Christmas.
We celebrate Christmas on the 25th day of December each year with religious indulgence and gifts of all nature to our loved ones. We may have flawed and sinned and now prostrate at the altar of Christ, asking for forgiveness; we make peace with each other over long-ago inflictions and infrictions. We beg forgiveness of our sins at the altar of Christ, for this day is the day Jesus Christ of Nazareth was born to us. Yet, How to Ruin… put so much on its plate: A wedding, funeral, and a baby shower, all at Christmas.
How to Ruin Christmas starts with Beauty Sello (Thando Thabethe), and Sbu Twala’s (Sandile Mahlangu) impending wedding over the weekend of Christmas. But the unexpected happens. Beauty’s sister Tumi Sello (Busi Lurayi) has overnight sex in a pool after a drunken stupor, with Themba Twala (Motlatsi Mashi), the brother of Sbu, the groom. Themba is also the groom’s maid and Tumi, is the bridesmaid for the wedding. The Twala family wakes up in a helter-skelter atmosphere as Themba couldn’t be found anywhere, and the family is about to call the wedding off. There’s a short standoff between the Twala family, and Sello’s seemingly assuming higher and richer social status, looking down on the Sello family as good for nothing and poor.
As if the scandal of sleeping with Themba got the wedding of her sister, Beauty almost derailed, Tumi Sello sneaks with Gogo, the Twala family matriarch from her cancer sick bed onto the town. They go fun parks and have lots of fun and even dance and butting together. Meanwhile, the Twala family finds that Tumi had taken Gogo out of her bed and house. The entire family stands on its toes, as they feared the worst would come to pass. On their way back to the Twala mansion, Gogo presses Tumi to deliver a letter for her to an old gangster who runs a strip joint. On arrival, Gogo is found dead.
Added to the wedding confusion is the unexpected death of Gogo. Gogo had left a letter for Tumi to deliver to a certain Mr. Mkhize in Durban; in the letter, Gogo leaves her last wish: to be cremated upon death. The letter and the relationship therein expose Gogo’s life in Durban: A stripper. Gogo had been in the street as well. One can only put one and one together to believe Gogo’s love for Tumi for their carefree spirits. She however leaves a powerful word of wisdom with Tumi. Tumi tells her too much sex in a marital relationship can complicate things. Especially with a lot of children. Gogo replies, “What complicates things in marriage leading to death, is regret.” While the Twala family is struggling over funeral expenses and all, Mr. Mkhize had taken the remains of Gogo from the funeral home to a crematorium.
The Twala family as usual tugs over the coffin and in the struggle, it capsized and opens up. And surprised, all family found out that Gogo’s body has been taken away from the coffin and no one knows where she is. None knew except Tumi and Mr. Mkhize knew of the body’s whereabouts. She’s at the crematorium and ready to be burnt away to ashes.
The family rushes to the crematorium and there is a show of struggle as family members plan to bury Gogo. Discussions about headstones and all. But Mr. Mkhize and Tumi are on the side of Gogo’s wish, to be cremated. Eventually, the family gives in and Gogo is pushed into the incinerator. I do not gainsay, cremation, but as long as we accept the Preacher at a funeral wafting dust on the coffin of our loved ones at burials, and repeating after them “dust to dust,” and then go on to “ashes to ashes,” then there must be a thin line between the two forms putting away our loved ones–burial/cremate. Maybe we may ask who invented that burial phrase, “dust to dust, ashes to ashes,” in the Book of Common Prayers, and we go on to believe that whichever way, we would be granted eternal life. Aunt Grace, who couldn’t accept cremation comments that “Gogo will have to go through two degrees of hell: here in the incinerator, and the hell hereafter.
Her ashes are thrown into the ocean and we go on to Beauty’s baby shower.
How to Ruin Christmas writers created a rounded plot and characters in the story. Mr. Vusi Twala for some reason has his bank account frozen, and poverty threatens his respect and status. The situation helps give the reason for Gogo’s cremation. The Twala family could no longer afford burial expenses for Gogo. Tumi’s character in the plot carries the story to the end to a large extent. Except for her mother, Dineo Sello, and boyfriend, Khaya Manquele (Yonda Thomas) everybody hated Tumi’s presence: “She’s no good news, “She has slept with half the men in town, “She’s a pothead.” But by her same waywardness, peace, at last, come over Twala’s and Sello’s families, as demonstrated at Beauty’s baby shower.
Word of caution: Never mix Christmas with a wedding and a funeral.
We regret to announce the death of Busi Lurayi at age 36, on July 10, 2022, in her home in Tembisi Gauteng SA. We at africanmovistar.com wish her well in her next journey to the underworld. Rest in peace.