On a map, the mountainous South African enclave is designated Nasaretha, but 80-year-old Mantoa (Mary Twala) and the other villagers coolly call it The Plains of Weeping. During the black plague, travelers from distant shores would pass through Nasaretha while transporting their sick to healing centers. Those who didn’t outlive the journey were buried in the valley, leaving their survivors ample space in which to settle. In a more metropolitan part of town, our narrator (Jerry Mofokeng) sits waxing philosophical while accompanying himself on a lesiba — a wind instrument with strings attached that, when blown into, reproduces a tone just slightly less unnerving than the tip of a shovel being dragged across concrete. Alone, having buried all of her loved ones, Mantoa longs for the release death will bring. Before going to bed, she summons the Grim Reaper, only to awaken each morning. Day after day, she sits glued to her transistor radio, listening as the necrology is read, half hoping to hear her name listed among the dead. (She paid $2000 to have a grave dug.) As the title indicates, God has other plans for our feisty lead. It is with a stone face and strong heart that she leads a rebellion that pits townsfolk against a government-planned flooding of the village and nearby cemetery that houses the remains of Mantoa’s family as well as the plot with her name on it. Other directors would take a dozen cuts to achieve what Lemohang Jeremiah Mosese does with one slight turn of the focal ring. Every color of the rainbow is called into service, infusing the boundless depth and rounded corners of the 4x3 image with a ViewMaster vividness. For a film whose rallying cry is “Nothing will endure!” one exits overburdened with feelings of hope. (2019) — Scott Marks