“A measured and harrowing central performance from Sophie Okonedo...
Her anguish lingers long after the end credits roll.”
- Mike Goodridge, Screen Daily
"This great film by Anthony Fabian tells this story through the eyes of a happy girl who grows into an outsider. This isn't one of those potted stories of uplift and doesn't end quite the way we expect, although we do get to see the real Sandra Laing right at the end."
Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun Times
"Of the innumerable, untold family tragedies that followed the imposition of the racist restrictions of the apartheid regime, the story of Sandra Laing is one of the most devastating. Skin tells her story with deep compassion and, for all its starkness and tragedy, it is a work of great beauty and inspiration."
Barry Ronge, The Sunday Times (South Africa)
"The journey to racial tolerance, which some people take for granted, has not been easy and over the years many people have struggled with the idea of accepting others as equals. It is within this context that all South Africans should be happy that a movie has been made that tells this story of race and racial tolerance which, thankfully, is slowly taking root in our society ."
Edward Tsumele , The Sowetan, South Africa
""We've all seen movies and TV shows based, or supposedly based, on true stories, but I can't remember the last time one of them affected me quite like the South African movie, SKIN."
Leonard Maltin's Secret's Out report
"To get a sense of just how deep the lingering effects of institutionalized racism must run, take yourself to Anthony Fabian's Skin, a powerful and compelling drama based on a true story that still resonates."
Marshall Fine, Huffington Post review
"In the end, SKIN isn't a movie about skin at all, but the indomitability of the human spirit." - Michael O'Sullivan, Washington Post review
"If ever there were a true-life tale that laid bare the laws of South African apartheid in all their arbitrary lunacy, it's the one dramatized in Anthony Fabian's straight-ahead biopic of Sandra Laing" - Ella Taylor, Village Voice review
"A South African family is divided by race." - Betsy Sharkey, LA Times review
"It isn't just the inhumanity of apartheid that's illustrated in "Skin," but the out-and-out lunacy of laws and classifications intended to keep blacks and whites apart." - Walter Addiego, San Francisco Chronicle review
http://moviedearest.blogspot.com/2009/10/reverends-reviews-beneath-skin.html
An Indian persective: Anthony Fabian interview in Indian Express
http://www.indianexpress.com/news/souls-of-black/542512/3
Channel Four Television
Channel 4 Interview with Sandra Laing & Anthony Fabian
Sophie Okonedo is interviewed on GMTV, ITV
Sandra Laing: The outcast "Sandra Laing was a black baby born to white parents at the height of apartheid. The hatred, rejection and heartache she suffered at the hands of the authorities, her teachers and her family sent shock waves across the world." Chrissy Iley, Sunday Times
"This powerful drama tells an important story from apartheid-era South Africa with honesty and real sensitivity. And the cast makes it thoroughly gripping by never playing it safe." - Rich Cline, Contact Music
"Powerful apartheid drama with a strong script, intriguingly complex characters and terrific performances from Sophie Okonedo, Sam Neill and Alice Krige." - Matthew Turner, London View
 "This quietly intelligent drama, based on a true story, finds a new way of dramatising race, class and society in apartheid-era South Africa, and it boasts fine performances by Sophie Okonedo, Sam Neill and Alice Krige as a family whose refusal to conform was either heroic or tragi-comic or merely dysfunctional. Or perhaps all three." - Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian
"Anthony Fabian's film tells such a bizarre story it could only be based on the truth. Sophie Okonedo – herself raised by white parents – devotes herself admirably to the part." - Anthony Quinn, The Independent
"An apartheid story no one would screen" - UK Independent editorial by Arifa Akbar, Arts correspondent
"In an increasingly mixed society keen to break down barriers, shouldn’t there be more enthusiasm for diversity in film?" - UK Times editorial: Skin - the movie and the obstacle
Sophie Okonedo on growing up with a huge afro and a Jewish mum, her new film Skin, and why she's excited about playing Winnie Mandela
- The Guardian - Question Time: Sophie Okonedo
The Guardian Film and Music Podcast with Andrew Pulver
Interview with Anthony Fabian
Skin - BBC World Service
We review 'Skin' - the new award-winning South African movie starring Sophie Okenedo and Sam Neill. The film tells the true story of Sandra Laing who was born in Piet Retief, a small conservative town in apartheid South Africa. The newspaper columnist Hannah Pool, who is Eritrean by birth but adopted by white British parents, comes into the studio to review it for us.
"In today’s PC world it’s easy to forget the absurdities of apartheid rules, or the way they still influence how we regard each other."
“One of the more bizarre illustrations of racial injustice under apartheid is dramatized in SKIN. An involving tale presented with polished straightforwardness, acted with conviction by Sophie Okonedo as well as Sam Neill and Alice Krige as the well-intentioned but often misguided parents.”
- Dennis Harvey, Variety
“A stirring allegory... Director Anthony Fabian's heartfelt attentions keep the picture on the right emotional track.”
Reviews from Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) 08
"A remarkably accomplished first feature" Toronto Star "This is a powerful movie. See it — but go prepared." Metro Toronto
Reviews from AFI Fest, Los Angeles
"Director Fabian’s debut is focused, well crafted, and free of sermons. "
Screen Crave
"Okonedo gives an outstanding performance as a woman forced to live in two worlds under the blistering rule of Apartheid. She’s so convincing that you hang on to her every word and movements."
"Skin is an extraordinary movie that respects the complexity of the issues involved."
"..looks at the hurtful legacy of apartheid in South Africa.."
Jamati
BBC Talking Movies, Toronto Film Festival - SKIN feature
St. Louis International Film Festival
"Sophie Okonedo - most known for her roles in Hotel Rwanda and The Secret Life of Bees - delivers an exceptional performance as the elder Sandra."
Beige World
Review from Honolulu
"..a most potent depiction of racism and a South Africa not very far in the past.
Dubai International Film Festival
"Skin: Treating difficult subjects"
"Sophie Okonedo, who plays Laing, does a fantastic job of capturing the full spectrum of her character ."
"More Than Skin Deep"
AFI Dallas International Film Festival 2009
Santa Barbara International Film Festival
Washington DC
‘Sandra’s undeserved pain—both emotional and physical—will break your heart, particularly when her eventually estranged husband declares: “Her skin is a curse.”’
- Tricia Olszewski, Washington DC City Paper
South Africa
"Skin is film-making of a very high order… there are no transcendent heroes, just people -- confused, afraid, wanting to love and be loved, caught in the web of a great evil and trying to make a go of things by their own best lights.
I cannot recall a film that captures so well the textures of SA, South Africans and life under apartheid."
- Simon Barber, Business Day
Pan African Film Festival, Los Angeles -l H. Clent Bowers, The Artists' Forum
Seattle Film Festival Review SIFF
Almost unbearable , May 26, 2009
By Jason Eckelman
“I don't know why, exactly, this movie resonated so much with me, but it damn near killed me. I was practically hysterical when it was over, and had to sit in the theater for several minutes after the film ended so I could pull myself together enough to leave. This had the potential to be emotionally manipulative & sentimental, but, in my opinion, it was brutally honest and totally real."
SIFF Interview with composer Helene Muddiman
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