
Panic Mechanic
Nov 29 1996
•2h 40m
•Comedy
When Hanky Pranky (alias Schucks), star of a candid camera TV show, loses his job to affirmative action, he applies for a job at a stress academy. It´s not long before Schucks discovers his new boss, Jack Paddaman, is as crooked as they come, but it´s too late: the employment contract is signed and sealed.A year passes, and Schucks is no better off. However, his candid camera videos, which poke fun at all sectors of post-1994 South Africa, prove a big hit with stressed-out government ministers. When the president asks Paddaman to make a movie to benefit street children, Schucks and his pals do all the hard work while Paddaman plans how he can get hold of the profits from the video sales. Add a scatterbrained secretary, a lovelorn traffic cop and a cunning street child and you have a roll-in-the aisles comedy with a distinctly South African flavour.
Cast
See all
Leon Schuster
Schuks
Tolla Van Der Merwe
Jakob
Frantz Dobrowsky
Jack Paddaman
Nana Stapelberg
Gloria Haasbroek
Recommendations
See all
Schuks Tshabalala's Survival Guide to South Africa
Leon Schuster or “Schuks Tshabalala” and Shorty (Alfred Ntombela) intend to produce a movie as a visual guide and aid for foreigners coming to SA for the World Cup. Schuks Tshabalala is a teacher and tour guide to a mixed bag of tourists who are taking his survival guide to SA very seriously. Shorty, as usual, is his best friend, assistant and conscience. The students include ”Heinz” from Germany, “Yoti” from Greece, “Jean-Pierre” from France, “Koert” from The Netherlands, “Rajin” from India, “Maggie” from Ireland and “Xing Xang” from China, among others. They are genuinely eager to learn about SA, so Schuks and Shorty are only too happy to oblige. What follows is a series of hysterical demonstrations of life in SA as they attempt to answer all the questions posed by potential visitors.

Sweet 'n Short
In South Africa, Sweet Coetzee wins an award for 20 years service as a sportscaster on his 40th birthday, beating his rival, pompous George "The Weasle" Weedle. After Sweet gets drunk one night at his birthday party, he misses a sportscast and his boss, Bryce Williams demotes him to interviewer and promotes Weedle. A subplot of the film are two robbers, "Bossy" and "Savage" who the main characters remain remotely unaware of as they are just a comic theme. Sweet pulls a prank on Weedle during a golf game and is suspended for six month. Sweet also records Weedle having humorous intercourse with a prostitute, "The Orphan in a Storm". Sweet then decides to drown his sorrows in a casino at the slot machines, where he tricks a small boy, Alfred "Shorty" Short into thinking he is a genie. Bossy and Savage try to rob the casino when they accidentally break the disco ball and it knocks Sweet unconscious just as he hits the jackpot.

Detective Knight: Independence
Detective James Knight 's last-minute assignment to the Independence Day shift turns into a race to stop an unbalanced ambulance EMT from imperiling the city's festivities. The misguided vigilante, playing cop with a stolen gun and uniform, has a bank vault full of reasons to put on his own fireworks show... one that will strike dangerously close to Knight's home.

Attack on Titan
As viable water is depleted on Earth, a mission is sent to Saturn's moon Titan to retrieve sustainable H2O reserves from its alien inhabitants. But just as the humans acquire the precious resource, they are attacked by Titan rebels, who don't trust that the Earthlings will leave in peace.