Synopsis
Christian Barnard from Cape Town didn’t write the great success-story of the first heart transplantation in 1967 alone. Hamilton Naki, a black man, was equally part of the sensational operation. «Hidden Heart» tells the story of two men, glamour, injustice and uprising.
On 3 December 2007, it will have been 40 years since the first transplant of a human heart was performed in South Africa. This transplant operation triggered a media response like few other events in the 20th century. Christian Barnard, the lead surgeon, became an internationally celebrated star overnight. A gifted self-promoter, charming and eloquent, he managed to maintain his star status until his death. He found himself welcomed into the circles of the rich and powerful in the entertainment industry, the business world as well as politics.
In the photographs showing the team following the heart transplant, the faces in the picture are all white. No mention is made of the black employees, who conducted the earlier experiments on dog hearts in the animal research lab. Experiments which were of essential importance to the eventual success of the human transplant. While they were not present in the operating theatre, it was their work that laid the foundations for the transplant. One of them was Hamilton Naki.
Up until the end of Apartheid 1994, Barnard was able to bask in the glory alone. Yet in the new democratic South Africa, the traumatic past was reopened from various sides and prominent events and achievements came under renewed scrutiny. Suddenly the name Hamilton Naki popped up in connection with the operation. National and international media latched onto the story of Naki, who fit the bill perfectly as an example of an unsung hero. Naki, moreover, gave us an entirely new version of the historic transplant operation. He claimed to have been present in the operating theatre. Barnard had allowed this, Naki explained, under the condition that he not tell a soul.
Like Barnard, Naki suddenly found himself besieged by journalists, accompanied by glory and fame that likewise came out of the blue. In recognition of this contribution and for his role leading up to the first heart transplant, the University of Cape Town conferred an honorary degree on Naki, the first time in its history it had ever done so for someone without an academic background. Thabo Mbeki awarded him the most important national order.
«Hidden Heart» will combine their career paths in the respective political context. The goal is not to assert that Naki could have been a Barnard were it not for Apartheid. Yet the goal is to work out undeniable parallels in the character of the two men, to show the possibilities for professional development within the political system and the way they each dealt with it and what they made of it. And finally, the film will attempt to show how history can be rewritten when a system seemingly cemented in place for eternity, falls apart.
The story of the two men not only recounts the heart transplant in a new light but also shows how determination and discipline – characteristics possessed by both men – can move mountains. The mountain moved by Barnard went down in the history books but this does not make Naki’s achievements any less – when recounted in the political context of the time. «Heart of Gold» knows no taboos, neither in its treatment of Naki nor of Barnard. The two are to be examined critically yet fairly through a multifaceted kaleidoscope of testimonials from carefully chosen witnesses from the period.