The Hitman
Indigenous Film Distribution, African Entertainers, and National Film and Video Production present Tshamano Sebo (Frank), Mitchelle Tiren (Lucy), Dumisani Dlamini (Scar), Nkosinathi Keswa (Nongoma), Muzi Mthabela (Governor), Jonathan Taylor (Mr. Sol). Writer/ Director, Norman Maake; Creative Producer Khetiwe Ncgobo; Executive Producers Norman Maake, Princess Rose Mhlongo, Yolanda Ncokotwana, Refiloe Hlabioa, Ben Amadasu; Producers Princess Rose Mhlongo, Norman Maake; Director of Photography, Chuanne Blofield.
Lucy (Mitchelle Tiren), a gambling table runner, finds herself in the crosshairs of Johannesburg’s underground criminal affairs. She didn’t kill anybody, spill beans on anybody, or try to snitch on a drug dealer. She’s not even a South African, but Kenyan, with a dream to enter the United States via South Africa. She and her only daughter, Angela, are economically strapped, and the government forces her daughter away from her. Lucy, too, has been flirting with drugs and heavy drinking. This is not made clear as a cause for losing her daughter; the story could not be told.
She ran into a taxi one morning, almost late for work, and got acquainted with Frank (Tshamano Sebo), the driver and owner of the taxi. They get off to a rough start but later mend their differences, especially when Frank notices Lucy isn’t hailing from SA and she’s all alone in the wild Joburg terrain. After work one night, she hung out with Mr. Sol (Jonathan Taylor) and ended up in his apartment, only to wake up in the middle of the night to witness Sol’s murder by a mean-looking man.
The mean-looking man’s name is Scar (Dumisani Dlamini), and he cannot stop until he has killed Lucy, as being the only witness to the murder of Sol. Scar is a hired hitman—one of those Apartheid-era remnants: Zulu warriors had formed an underground organization of hired killers. It turns into a society called Inkabi. A sworn and avowed Inkabi can never retract from an assignment or plot to kill another Inkabi.
By chasing Lucy out of her breath, Scar runs into Frank (Tshamano Sebo), a retired Inkabi. He, too, had done many hired killings in his heyday—a matter of fact, better than Scar, as we will find out. Frank was a great hitman and had retired after he survived a gruesome attack; his car was riddled with bullets from assassins who were after his life for ransom. “Everybody thought I was dead. But I miraculously survived. So, I took that opportunity to live a new life.” Now, he takes a pinky promise to protect the young lady with whom he had had a rough encounter. Frank swears to protect Lucy to the end. “But what if he came after me?” Lucy asks Frank.
Frank, “You need to make sure you are always visible. So that he can believe that you are alone, and when he makes his move, I’ll have my eyes on him.”
Lucy, “What if he takes this time to shoot at me?”
“He won’t. He’s a warrior. He wants you close so that you can fight for your life. He wants to take you with the spear. He wants to feel the flow of life coming out of your body, just like he did with Mr. Saul. That’s the kind of kill he’s after.”
Lucy is agape, in disbelief as to what will happen to her. Frank shows a little revolver in his palm.
Frank, “Now, Lucy (places the gun in Lucy’s palm), Just in case.”
That is where Scar and Frank, both Inkabis, sworn and avowed to the organization code, never to challenge one another, stand; just now, all bets are off. When Frank meets Scar at his stakeout, they break the Inkabi vows.
Scar, “Put the gun down. Let’s fight like men.”
They both go at it in a fistfight, with Scar brandishing his warrior dagger.”
Scar. I’m a warrior…a hitman doesn’t hate.”
By and by, Frank had killed Scar, found himself in the Governor’s fence, slaughtered many of the securities, and eventually ended up in front of the Governor. Inkabi shares similarities with Heart of the Hunter (2024). Leads in both films are called from retirement. Bonko Cosmo (Zuko) in Hearts…. presents Bruce Willis’s (Die Hard) performance. Comparatively, Zuko had more fighting power than Frank in Inkabi. Yet both achieved their levels of ambition in the stories. In Inkabi, Frank kills Scar, a hitman, and lets Lucy shoot and kill the Governor with the revolver Frank had given her earlier.
What I am missing in this story is the reason behind Mr. Sol’s killing. All we see is a heavy-set guy with a leather briefcase full of rands under his arm. He presents it to these two Zulu-like warriors, one of whom we later know as Scar. He leaves behind a picture of a White man, whom we later know as Mr. Sol.
The story behind Mr. Sol’s assassination is not made clear in the story; you bet he had a brush-off with the Governor (Muzi Mthabela), which is why the Governor puts money on his head. This Governor is not clean; he is into poaching and selling illegal ivories off the continent. This is where the police turn her into the Governor and his jeep load of guards. Her half-dead body is slumped in front of the Governor.
As historical and crucial as Inkabi is to the Apartheid and post-Apartheid eras in South Africa, Scar and Frank portray that the era of paid assassins is controversial and, therefore, must be on its way out of modern civilization. That is why we see both Frank and Scar stand to each other. Here! Scar goes out of bounds when he goes after Lucy, who wasn’t marked to be assassinated; it was Sol. Only by accident and hustling to survive did Lucy get in the mix.
Frank got out of retirement to take care of Lucy. No one knew he was alive or could be “counted among the living.” He has not gone out of his expertise, though. We see he and Scar got into the mano-a-mano. Frank tricks him when he asks him to put the gun away. He does, and with all the mystic Inkabi dagger he has, Frank kills him. I believe Inkabi–The Hitman is not so much about Lucy as about the duel between the old order of the organization. For instance, there are organizations in other parts of Africa, such as Poro, in Sierra Leone, Guinea, and Liberia, most of which I won’t even account for on the Continent. They are no assassins. Inkabi, on the other hand, is just a remnant of the ills of Apartheid. The Zulus were originally outstanding hunters but only hunted in the wild. Inkabis kill humans in the concrete jungle of Johannesburg.