, directed by Ian Sharp
and starring Ray Winstone
and Temuera Morrison
.
Story
Arajan (Winstone), an Afrikaner veteran of the Boer Warand master tracker, is promised a bounty to capture Kereama (Morrison), a Māori seafarer accused of killing a British soldier.
Keremea, who protests his innocence, repeatedly escapes and is recaptured. Arajan and Kereamea get to know and respect each other, and there is a showdown with British troops led by Major Carlyle (Gareth Reeves).
The filmmakers describe the story's background as follows:
The Second Boer WarSecond Boer WarThe Second Boer War was fought from 11 October 1899 until 31 May 1902 between the British Empire and the Afrikaans-speaking Dutch settlers of two independent Boer republics, the South African Republic and the Orange Free State...
, a conflict between the British EmpireBritish EmpireThe British Empire comprised the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom. It originated with the overseas colonies and trading posts established by England in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. At its height, it was the...
and the two independent BoerBoerBoer is the Dutch and Afrikaans word for farmer, which came to denote the descendants of the Dutch-speaking settlers of the eastern Cape frontier in Southern Africa during the 18th century, as well as those who left the Cape Colony during the 19th century to settle in the Orange Free State,...
republics in South AfricaSouth AfricaThe Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...
, lasted from 11 October 1899 until 31 May 1902.With the British in nominal control of the republics by 1901, the Boer farmers adopted guerrilla warfare
Guerrilla warfareGuerrilla warfare is a form of irregular warfare and refers to conflicts in which a small group of combatants including, but not limited to, armed civilians use military tactics, such as ambushes, sabotage, raids, the element of surprise, and extraordinary mobility to harass a larger and...
tactics: strike fast and hard causing as much damage to the enemy as possible, and then withdraw and vanish before enemy reinforcements could arrive. This strategy proved effective and the British were forced to revise their own tactics.The British retaliated with a “Scorched Earth
Scorched earthA scorched earth policy is a military strategy or operational method which involves destroying anything that might be useful to the enemy while advancing through or withdrawing from an area...
” policy, bringing the Boers to their knees. As British troops swept the countryside, they systematically destroyed crops, burned homesteads and farms, poisoned wells, and interned Boer women and children in concentration camps.In the aftermath, many of the defeated Boers were unable to return to their farms at all; others attempted to do so but were forced to abandon farms as unworkable given the damage caused by farm burning and salting of the fields in the course of the scorched earth policy. Thus, many drifted to the far corners of the empire, in search of a new home...
Cast
The cast consists of British and New Zealander actors.- Arjan: Ray Winstone
- Kereama: Temuera Morrison
- Carlyle: Gareth Reeves
- Saunders: Mark Mitchinson
- Rennick: Dan Musgrove
- Bryce: Andy Anderson (actor)Andy Anderson (actor)Andy Anderson is an actor best known for his roles on both Australian and New Zealand television.-Career:...
- Leybourne: Mick Rose
- Lucy: Jodie Hillock
Production
Director: Ian SharpWriter: Nicholas Van Pallandt
The film is a co-production of the UK Film Council
and New Zealand Film Commission
.
It was shot around the Queenstown
lakes area.
Run
Tracker opened in the UK on April 22, 2011. The film went to DVD in June 2011, distributed internationally by Kaleidoscope Entertainment.