The sky over the ramshackle ghetto in "Tsotsi" is a dirty brown. Beneath it are shacks made of flimsy wood and tin. There's
smoke and filth everywhere. It's hell on earth. What better setting for a tale of redemption? "Tsotsi" is a slang term for a thug in Johannesburg, and it's the only name the film's protagonist (played by Presley Chweneyagae) goes by. So long has the young man been parentless, directionless and given to delinquency that no one knows his real name. He's a tsotsi, nothing more. With his fellow hoodlums and devoted followers Boston (Mothusi Magano), Butcher (Zenzo Ngqobe) and Aap (Kenneth Nkosi), Tsotsi makes his living through theft. Boston, who was supposedly once a teacher, is horrified when a simple robbery on a subway train turns into murder; for voicing his objection, Tsotsi beats him savagely.
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