ENCOUNTERS 2024: ROLLABALL (World Premiere)(with Q&A)

Every year since our founding in 2010, The Bioscope has proudly hosted screenings of The Encounters South African International Documentary Festival. Now over 25 years old as a festival, Encounters returns to The Bioscope once again with screenings from 21 June - 30 July. Tickets are R80. For more information on the festival as a whole, please visit encounters.co.za

SEE THE FULL BIOSCOPE SCHEDULE FOR ENCOUNTERS HERE

ROLLABALL

Eddie Edwards | South Africa | 2024 | 72 min

We follow two friends from Accra’s skate soccer team over a 10 year period as they live their dream of going from amateur status to players in an internationally recognised sport. Through ambitious and volatile Smallee and talented but troubled Dungu we see the highs and lows of their professional lives. Can they stay the course while the team gears up for an international tournament against arch rival Nigeria? Skate soccer is a game created by athletes living with disabilities that is every bit as skillful and antagonistic as the able-bodied version of the game. There’s no skate soccer at the Paralympics; there is no tournament anywhere in the world for them, so the team is going at it on their own. The team hopes that their sporting successes might bring more awareness to their personal situation, and help them access the resources they need to be more accepted in society. Coach and manager Albert K Frimpong sets up a match that will pit Ghana against Nigeria, with media attention and significant prize money on offer. The journey to this day is hard-going: in-fighting, power struggles and disappearances threaten to bring the team to its knees. The film tracks Smallee and Dungu, and the marathon effort of the team from a back street taxi rank onto an international stage.