The award-winning Afrikaans drama The Heart Is a Muscle with English subtitles will open in cinemas nationally on March 6, with Pretoria audiences able to watch it in Pretoria east.

Written and directed by Imran Hamdulay, the film offers a deeply intimate portrait of a man wrestling with inherited trauma and the possibility of redemption.

The film won the Panorama Independent Jury Prize at the 75th Berlin International Film Festival. It was also recognised as the best feature film at the kykNET Silwerskermfees.

The film was selected as South Africa’s official entry for the Best International Feature Film category at the 98th Academy Awards (Oscars).

At the centre of the story is Ryan, portrayed by Keenan Arrison, whose previous screen credits include The Umbrella Men and the Netflix series The Crown.

In this role, Arrison delivers a performance defined by restraint and emotional depth.

Arrison took some time out to speak to Rekord about the film.

“It was the honesty,” Arrison says of what first drew him to the script. “The script did not try to moralise or provide easy answers. I read it and felt the weight of this man, Ryan, who is trying so hard to be good but is battling against the ghosts his father left him. It felt like a great privilege and a serious responsibility to tell this story.”

Ryan is a character who carries much beneath the surface. Arrison explains that preparation extended beyond conventional rehearsals.

“A lot of our preparation was not about the script. Imran and I did not do traditional rehearsals. Instead, we spent hours talking about our fathers, about rhythm, about music and life. We spoke about emotional landscapes and what lies beneath the surface,” he says. “It was about building an inner world for Ryan so that his silences would speak as loudly as his actions.”

The emotional demands of the role were significant.

“To play a man caught between the harsh lessons of his father and the father he desperately wants to be, I had to look at my own relationship with my dad, and his relationship with his dad,” Arrison says. “You have to ask yourself, ‘What is that cycle?’ and that introspection is challenging.”

Technically, he added, the difficulty lay in holding back. “It was about restraint, knowing when to let the volcano erupt and when to keep it all simmering just beneath the surface.”

The film’s exploration of masculinity left a lasting impression on him.

“The film deliberately looks at the other side of masculinity, through a kinder lens,” Arrison says. “So often, the conversation about men is about dominance and violence. But this story digs deeper, into the quieter, more fragile terrain. It asks, ‘What does it mean for a man to forgive his father? To forgive himself?’”

For Arrison, true strength in the film is not expressed through aggression.

“True strength is not the violence Ryan shows when his son is missing; it is the vulnerability he finds when he must face the man he hurt and confront his own past,” he said. “As men, we are so trapped in a cage of silence, and this film is a conversation starter to break out of it.”

His collaboration with Hamdulay was built on trust.

“Imran wrote this character and told me he had me in mind while writing, which is a huge compliment,” Arrison says. “He understood Ryan immediately and trusted me to inhabit him. At a certain point, he simply handed Ryan over to me.”

Certain scenes remain with him long after filming.

“The scene in the ruins of the burned house comes to mind,” he says. “It is where the physical manifestation of the past meets the emotional truth. Ryan wants to forget, but the film shows that healing is not about forgetting. It is about learning to live with the ache.”

Arrison credits his fellow cast members, including Dean Marais, Melissa de Vries, Danny Ross, Ridaa Adams, Loren Loubser and Robyn Rossouw, for creating an atmosphere of authenticity.

“When you have actors who are so grounded and truthful, it lifts your own performance,” he says. “In all honesty, they made me look good.”

Realism was essential to his portrayal.

“The Cape Flats is not just a backdrop; it is a character in the story,” Arrison says. “To play Ryan, I could not come in with a performance. I had to exist in that space. The goal was to be so truthful that the audience forgets they are watching a film.”

He did not distance himself from the character’s emotional journey.

“You cannot keep distance from a role like this. It demands that you go inward,” he says. “It is about using personal emotions to fuel the character’s truth.”

Reflecting on the film’s place in South African cinema, Arrison believes it sits at the heart of the country’s storytelling tradition.

“It is an intimate character study of one man, but his personal story is deeply tied to the landscape and the social history of the Cape Flats,” he says. “It is deeply South African and universally relevant.”

Ultimately, he hopes audiences leave with a sense of hope.

“Even though it deals with heavy themes, the upside is that it is about healing,” Arrison says. “I hope it makes people, especially men, question the cycles they are a part of. I hope they leave feeling that the heart, like a muscle, can grow stronger through pain.”

Arrison, who trained at AFDA in Cape Town, says his studies laid the groundwork for his discipline. The film and drama school also has a campus in Hatfield, Pretoria.

“AFDA gave me the foundation. It taught me to respect the process and understand that you are part of a bigger collaborative machine,” he says. “The emphasis on character and story above all else is something I carry with me to every set.”

– Watch the trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8X129RPMmOM

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