Best South African animation movies

Get ready to binge. We've found a collection of must-watch animation films from South Africa, now streaming on Netflix, HBO, Hulu, Prime Video, and other top services!

  • Poster for Khumba

    Khumba 2013

    A half-striped zebra is blamed for the drought and leaves his herd in search of his missing stripes. He is joined on his quest by an overprotective wildebeest and a flamboyant ostrich; they defeat the tyrannical leopard and save his herd.

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  • Poster for Seal Team

    Seal Team 2021

    After his best friend is killed in a shark attack, Quinn, a lovable yet tenacious seal assembles a SEAL TEAM to fight back against a gang of sharks overtaking the neighborhood. But this merry band of international seals are not at all trained for such a mission. They seek the help of a much more skillful combatant, Claggart, but even his tricks and flips can’t whip these guys into shape. However, with a little bit of ingenuity, intelligence and a lot of heart, our SEAL TEAM may actually be able to bring peace back to their undersea community.

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  • Poster for Headspace

    Headspace 2023

    This is an alien invasion film like no other – the aliens are miniature but still want to take over the world!

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  • Poster for The Lion of Judah

    The Lion of Judah 2011

    Upon learning that Judah has been trapped in the clutches of the townspeople and faces the possibility of being the sacrifice at the annual Festival, the stable mates leave their cozy barn and embark on an adventure to find and free their friend.

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  • Poster for Shaka Inkosi YamaKhosi

    Shaka Inkosi YamaKhosi 2021

    A young meek boy, Manzini is bullied by three boys on his way back from school in an incident that almost costs him his life. Manzini confesses to his Gogo his desire to quit school. His Gogo narrates a profound tale of resilience evoking the coming-of-age story of a great warrior and King, Shaka Zulu to inspire her grandson through the strength of his lineage.

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  • Poster for The Next Few Months

    The Next Few Months 2019

    The effects of cancer and its subsequent treatments on an individual, and his family.

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  • Poster for 3 Teaspoons of Sugar

    3 Teaspoons of Sugar 2019

    In a household where meal times are a delightful feast full of bonding, fellowship and good eating, 3 members of this tight-knit family are diagnosed with Diabetes Mellitus.

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  • Drawn 2013

    As they sit across from one another at a coffee shop table, a young couple takes to the tablecloth and journeys through their own individual worlds to reach each other.

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  • Poster for My Mum's Bonkers

    My Mum's Bonkers 2017

    About the loss of a mother, with her unexpected exuberance, but who also cries Puccini melodies. A short poetic collage, as fleeting as the blink of an eye, where sounds and images are superimposed to evoke the at once peaceful and tormented memory of a mother.

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  • Poster for Dodgy Links

    Dodgy Links 2020

    Dodgy Links a about a gullible and not so internet savvy office employee who falls for the very common spam pop-up of "you are the lucky 999 999th visitor on this website!". The consequence of this, however, is quite different for this unlucky circular thing.

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  • Poster for The Tale of How

    The Tale of How 2006

    This lavishly embellished, comically operetta CGI fantasy story takes place in the Indian Ocean, where a flock of “piranha birds” has settled on the back of an octopus. When an octopus is starved, it feeds on birds on its back, but because it is already threatened with extinction, they decide to send a bottle across the sea with a call for help.

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  • Poster for Hadidance

    Hadidance 2019

    One night, a female bird heads into a bar determined to find love. Outwardly she seems to be incredibly outgoing and popular, everyone seems to want to get her attention, but underneath there is a dark layer of insecurity. A muscled seagull and a majestic peacock both catch her eye and she thinks that one of them might be the one, however upon interacting with them, she realises that there is more than good looks and charm. This eventually drives her to confront her own insecurities.

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  • Sobriety, Obesity & Growing Old 1991

    Sobriety, Obesity and Growing Old picks up the narrative and themes begun in Kentridge's first film, Johannesburg the Second Greatest City after Paris, and follows the development of the relationships between his cast of invented characters, Soho Eckstein, his wife and her lover, Felix Teitelbaum. These relationships reflect, metaphorically, the changing political situation in South Africa at the time the film was made. Demonstrations and marches in opposition to the apartheid régime together with the governmental relaxation of most of the State of Emergency regulations and restrictions heralded the beginning of a change in the country's power structure (and white attitudes towards black African rights). Soho, a symbol of South African white power, develops the capacity for awareness, longing and love and the potential for guilt and repentance.

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  • Poster for History of the Main Complaint

    History of the Main Complaint 1996

    History of the Main Complaint is the sixth film [of a] series and is based on twenty-one drawings. It was made shortly after the establishment in South Africa of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, headed by Archbishop Desmond Tutu. It was set up to conduct a series of public hearings into abuses of human rights perpetrated during the apartheid era. The hearings, in which individuals told their stories of personal suffering, were held in order to make reparation for abuse and in the hope of creating reconciliation between peoples. The underlying theme of this film is a (self) recognition of white responsibility. This is played out through a 'medical' investigation into the body of Soho Eckstein, the white property-developing magnate and greedy-capitalist protagonist of most of the preceding films, which provides the starting point for a revelation of conscience. (tate.org.uk)

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  • Poster for Johannesburg, 2nd Greatest City After Paris

    Johannesburg, 2nd Greatest City After Paris 1989

    William Kentridge’s ironic tribute to his hometown, animated on the basis of 25 drawings, is the first film of his “Drawing for Protection” cycle, in which he unfolds the triangle between Johannesburg building tycoon Soho Eckstein, his wife, and the dreamer Felix Teitelbaum. In this film he introduces the central characters of his meta-narrative which, located in a South Africa of the last days of a crumbling Apartheid, becomes an allegorical reflection on socio-political power relations.

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  • Poster for Mine

    Mine 1991

    A journey into the mines provides a visual representation of a journey into the conscience of Kentridge's invented character, Soho Eckstein, the white South African property owner who exploits the resources of land and black human labour which are under his domain. Throughout the film the imagery shifts between the geological landscape underground inhabited by innumerable black miners and Soho's world of white luxury above ground. When Soho, breakfasting in bed, pushes down the plunger of his cafetière, its movement is transformed into a rapid descent through the tray, through the bed and into the mine-shaft. Here the miners' world of overwhelming misery is depicted in claustrophobic tunnels where they are trapped digging, drilling and sleeping, embedded in rock. Above ground, Soho sits at his desk in his customary pin-stripe suit and punches adding machines and cash registers, creating a flow of gold bars, exhausted miners, blasted landscapes and blocks of uniform housing.

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  • Poster for Tengers

    Tengers 2007

    Whilst working on "the great South African novel," an unemployed writer gets caught up in the harsh realities of life in the city of Johannesburg.

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  • Jungle Beast - The movie 2020

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  • Poster for Bru & Boegie: The Movie

    Bru & Boegie: The Movie 2019

    Bru and Boegie need to think big to get people to watch their shorts online, so they make South Africa's first full-length 2D animated movie.

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