I’ve just seen the 2008 movie “Skin,” based on the life of South African Sandra Laing. And what a life she has lived! Born in 1955 to two apparently Caucasian parents in Apartheid South Africa, Sandra has decidedly non-white features and a skin color several shades darker than her Afrikaner parents. At a time when DNA testing was not yet developed, the parents lived with rumors that the mother had slept with a black man, which, of course, would make the Apartheid-supporting, politically conservative father an especially insulted cuckold. (We now know that 11% of Afrikaners have non-white ancestors.) Rather than acknowledge his daughter’s clearly non-white looks, Leon Laing—who apparently loved his daughter very much—insisted on her whiteness and insisted on white society treating her as white. He successfully challenged the nation’s racial classifications and managed to get his daughter officially designated as white in 1967, but his daughter’s actual experience didn’t improve. People’s responses were based on what they saw and what they saw was a light-skinned black girl—a mixed race child.

Within the Apartheid system, Sandra became, for all practical purposes, a non-person. A “white” woman on paper, it was illegal for her to live with her first husband, a black man. It was also illegal for her to have his child. She risked being arrested at any time. She could not get papers to change her legal status to Coloured (mixed race), because her father wouldn’t give her access to her birth certificate. She was jailed for three months for sleeping with her first husband. When she gave birth to her children, she could not go to a black hospital or a white hospital.

“Skin” does a pretty decent job in depicting Sandra’s story, though it simplifies many of the hardships she experienced. Her two brothers are depicted in the film, but they have virtually no speaking lines. In real life, Sandra’s brothers have no contact with her, so they no doubt did not cooperate in the making of the film. Sandra’s father disowned her after she slept with her first husband, and he died of cancer without reconciling. Sandra’s mother was reunited with her shortly before her mother’s death.

It’s a very sad and unhappy story, except to say that Sandra has survived it all, in her own fashion. “Skin” is a sensitively-made film that conveys the emotional story, but it breaks no new ground technically or narratively-speaking. Sophie Okonedo, the mixed-race actress who plays Sandra, is a little too ethereal for the role. Queen Latifa or Jill Scott would have been better choices. (Check out Jill Scott’s excellent performances in the recent HBO TV series, “The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency.”) If only the film were as challenging and original as Sandra herself.

P.S. There’s a biography of Sandra Laign’s life, written by journalist Judith Stone: When She Was White: The True Story of a Family Divided by Race. If Amazon.com reader reviews are any indication, the book is a good read.

P.S.S. To see a brief documentary of Sandra’s life, click here >