Abstract
ReaGilès are pre-fabricated, self-contained, education and entertainment complexes situated
on 400m² sites at local schools or public open spaces consisting of a 60 seat cinema, 30 seat
computer and internet facility, community care and policing centre. These complexes were
intended to service historically under-serviced peri-urban black dormitory townships and to
help create jobs, especially amongst the youth, women and the disabled. The ReaGilè concept
has the potential to revolutionise exhibition and distribution in local film industries in ways
mirroring the ground-breaking Nollywood straight-to-DVD model. The article discusses the
potential of the ReaGilè concept to offer solutions to the twin crises: of i) representation
stemming from existing film distribution networks that limit micro-budget filmmakers and, ii)
of government departments and local municipalities’ tendency towards dividing practices that
objectivise the subject through frustrating development via delays, paperwork, never-ending
meetings, fees, endless formalities and legalities, and red-tape. The authors posit that ReaGilè
has the potential to creatively redesign formal distribution models and to fracture the narrow
modernisation paradigm they deploy, replacing them with a responsive communication
re/ordering and flexible distribution that restores subjectivity to the disenfranchised South
African subject (the filmmaker from the township).