By Tina Yazdi
The Team by Patrick Reed, Kelly Jenkins, and Peter Raymont follows the production and post-production of a soap opera that is attempting to create a shared experience through fiction to address the ethnic tensions prevalent in Kenyan society. The show is controversial, and the ethnically diverse cast experience conflicts on and off set internally and externally. Kenya, which had been considered Africa’s success story, was pushed towards civil war after the December 2007 Presidential elections brought ethnic tensions to the surface. Ethnic suspicion and violence continue to be major issues in the country. The documentary has the feel of a reality TV show.
The Redemption of General Butt Naked by Eric Strauss & Daniele Anastasion challenges audiences by presenting a former Liberian warlord turned Christian evangelist in all his idiosyncratic complexity. Joshua Milton Blahyi was a feared figure during Liberia’s 14-year civil war. Some extent of his heinous crimes was revealed at the truth commissions for Liberia, an excerpt of which is shown in the movie. He eventually renounces his past and turns to religion. The film presents his efforts to reconcile with his past victims and help his community as sometimes genuine and sometimes questionable. This film does not present the story in a pretty package for the audience but instead leaves you to struggle with how one can judge someone’s actions in cases of extreme violence and conflict. Disturbingly, the same skills Blahyi uses in preaching are what had earlier made him a successful and feared warlord.
Valley of the Moon by Giovanni Buccomino is set by the Sardinian Sea in Italy, where in 1971 a hippie community developed and 40 years later is still a destination for artists and travelers from many subcultures. It’s a movie about a subculture that defies cultural norms and defiantly continues to thrive in the face of modernity, or perhaps as a reaction to it.
Image Courtesy: IMDb
Comments
Post new comment