Imran Hamdulay starts shooting Pieces with Kim Engelbrecht and Keenan Arrison

Imran Hamdulay is back behind the camera. Principal photography has started in and around Cape Town on Pieces, his second feature, which he wrote and is directing. The production announced the start of the shoot on 22 October and expects to wrap in November.

Kim Engelbrecht, the Emmy-nominated star of Reyka and Raised by Wolves, leads the cast with Keenan Arrison, who also appeared in Hamdulay's first film, The Heart is a Muscle, and in Kings of Joburg. Cedwyn Joel, known for Kelders van Geheime and Suidooster, joins them. Two young newcomers, Asher Jacobs and Tazwill Spogter, make their screen debuts.

The announcement is a start of photography, not a release. Pieces is due to premiere in 2027. Indigenous Film Distribution and Development will release it in South Africa. Nothing in the announcement gives a festival, a trailer date or a local opening weekend.

Two brothers and a family in transition

Pieces is told from the point of view of two young brothers. Their mother is about to remarry and leave the house they grew up in, and each boy comes to terms with the father they lost in his own way. That is the plot the production has put on the record. It is a family story set around a house that will not stay the same, told through the boys rather than through the adults deciding the move.

Hamdulay described it in the production's announcement:

Pieces is a simple story about two boys trying to understand their father, their family, and the world that is changing around them. It's a film about loss, but it's funny in places, sad in others, and always kind to its characters.

The quote is the director's account of tone. It is not a review, and the film has not been shown. What a reader can take from it is the brief he has given himself: loss, some comedy, and a refusal to be cruel to the characters. Whether the finished film does that is a 2027 question.

Jacobs and Spogter are making their screen debuts in those brother roles. Engelbrecht and Arrison are the known names around them. Arrison's earlier work with Hamdulay was on The Heart is a Muscle, so this is a second collaboration, not a first meeting. Joel arrives from two of the country's long-running Afrikaans series. The announcement does not say who plays the mother, the new partner, or the father the boys are trying to understand.

The first of five NFVF micro-budget films

The film is the first of five micro-budget features funded by the National Film and Video Foundation. Being first in a slate is a different fact from being a one-off indie. The foundation has committed to five films on this model, and Pieces is the one that has started shooting.

Adam Thal, whose credits include The Last Ranger and Rise: The Siya Kolisi Story, and Casey Diepeveen, whose credits include Trifole, are producing for The Star Film Company. Pierre de Villiers, who shot Black Burns Fast and This is not a Burial, It's a Resurrection, is the cinematographer. Those credits are the production's way of saying who is in charge of the money, the schedule and the image. The announcement does not publish the budget, the number of shooting days, or how a micro-budget is defined in rand.

Dr Shadrack Bokaba, whose appointment as NFVF chief executive the foundation announced on 1 October, welcomed the film in the same announcement. He called it a deeply felt South African story from a gifted filmmaker, and said the NFVF was delighted to support it. The quote sits three weeks after he took the job. It is the new chief executive attaching his name to the first title in the micro-budget slate, not a review of footage.

The slate arrives during a busy few weeks for the foundation. On 30 September it named Variasies op 'n Tema, Variations on a Theme, as South Africa's entry for the 99th Academy Awards. On 12 October it called for nominations to its council. Pieces is not that Oscar entry. It is a separate decision: a new film, from a new slate, announced while the foundation is also choosing the country's awards submission and refreshing its council. A reader who conflates the three will mis-state what is shooting in Cape Town.

Following an Oscar submission

Hamdulay's debut, The Heart is a Muscle, premiered at the 2025 Berlinale, where it won the Ecumenical Jury Prize. It went on to win best feature at the 2025 Silwerskermfees and was South Africa's submission for the international feature award at the 98th Academy Awards. Pieces is the next film from that director, with one actor returning, a new story, and a different source of money.

The debut's record is context for why this shoot is news. It is not a promise that Pieces will travel the same path. Berlin, Silwerskerm and an Oscar submission are already finished events on the first film. The second film is in its first weeks of photography, with a wrap expected in November and a premiere set for 2027. Between those dates the film still has to be cut, sold into festivals if that is the plan, and delivered to Indigenous Film Distribution and Development for the South African release.

Cape Town and its surroundings are the location the production has named. It has not published a suburb list, a permit note or a call for extras. The useful local fact is the one it did publish: the cameras are turning now, and they expect to stop in November.

What is still unannounced

The production has not given a budget, a shooting-day count, a festival premiere, or a South African release date inside 2027. It has not named the full cast beyond Engelbrecht, Arrison, Joel, Jacobs and Spogter. It has not said whether the other four micro-budget films have titles, directors or start dates. Bokaba's support is on the record. The council nominations called on 12 October are a separate process, and this article does not treat them as a decision about Pieces.

What is on the record is enough for the news. A second Hamdulay feature is shooting in Cape Town. Engelbrecht and Arrison lead. The NFVF is funding it as the first of five micro-budget films. Indigenous Film Distribution and Development will release it here. The premiere year is 2027.

The Callsheet carried the production announcement on 22 October, including the comments from Hamdulay and from NFVF chief executive Shadrack Bokaba. The foundation announced Bokaba's appointment on 1 October. The Heart is a Muscle record cited here is its 2025 Berlinale premiere and Ecumenical Jury Prize, its Silwerskermfees best feature, and its selection as South Africa's submission for the 98th Academy Awards.