Achi news desk-
Original Sin: My Son The Killer now streaming on Showmax, with Saree‘s Marteli Brewispraises the true-crime documentary as “moving” and Cape Talk’s Sara-Jayne King praises it as “absolutely gripping viewing.”
The Showmax Original follows Thea Pretorius, the mother of Gerhard Jansen van Vuuren, who murdered his 25-year-old girlfriend Andrea Venter in front of her neighbours, security guards and CCTV cameras. He then evaded authorities in South Africa and Brazil for years, assuming three different identities and starting families with multiple daughters. After initially helping him escape, Thea slowly had to come to terms with her son as a murderer. As she admits in the trailer, “He can do worse.”
Former South African Police Service chief profiler Dr Gérard Labuschagne worked on hundreds of murder cases but says in the true crime documentary, “This was definitely one of the more brutal ones I’ve seen … This was definitely in the realm of what we did was considered excessive.”
He says Andrea’s story shows how difficult it can be to leave an abusive relationship. “We all think the victim should get up and leave,” he said, but “people are being sucked into this web of violence. And sometimes this person’s absolute fear is, ‘If I leave, he’s going to kill me.’ He left her, and found her. She took out a protection order, but the police did nothing…”
Pretorius also appears in Showmax’s Tracing Thabo Bester a Brother Boer documentaries but he says this is the case that “stands out the most” in his career. “I finally left the force on the first of March, 2016. People asked me what was the most prominent case in your career, and I guess people often expected me to say the case of a serial killer, because I was working on a lot of them. Or, you know, a strange murder, very strange, but this was it… Because of the unfinished business and the unfairness of it all. It felt personal, and I think a lot of people in the case felt the same way.”
Original sin is directed by John Gutierrez, whose credits include Sons of the Sea, who won the Best South African Film in Durban, and edited the Grammy award Tom Petty and the Heartbreak: Running a Dream.
Original sina cat and mouse chase across two continents intertwines with CCTV footage of Andrea’s murder; film of Gerhard’s trials; and interviews with their families, as well as the Brazilian Federal Police, Rio de Janeiro Interpol and South African police and legal teams on the case.
The documentary feature is a co-production between Showmax, Rogan Productions (BAFTA winner RebellionBAFTA nominees Freddie Mercury: The Final Act a Putin: The Story of a Russian Spy), and The Electric Shadow Company (BAFTA nominee queen, Hot Docs Jury Winner Name Me Lawand), in collaboration with Combined Artists (Strangers You Know, Carte Blanche) and Red Earth (Narcoworld: Dope Stories).
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Watch the trailer:
Further details: https://www.showmax.com/
X: @ShowmaxOnline
Main photo: Showmax
