(no subject)
War/Dance, 2007. Dir. Sean FINE, Andrea NIX FINE. THINKFilm.
A powerful documentary, even though it's too slick in many ways - too gorgeous, shots too slow - it's still powerful, and I'm not at all convinced that the goal is (as the Variety critic stated) to make the Western audience feel better about " genocide and global negligence." I mean, really? Even if things do seem too scripted at times, I find it hard to fathom that someone could feel that much better about the situation in Uganda after hearing a 14 year old boy say, regarding the time he and other children abducted by the Lord's Resistance Army were ordered to kill a field of farmers with the farmers' own hoes:
"Those farmers did nothing wrong. We killed them for no reason. They died a sad death it hurt me in so many ways. I've never even told my mother that I was forced to kill people."
Yes! I feel so much better about the upheaval and violence in Africa. After all, he enjoys playing the xylophone now, doesn't he? And he's even quite good at it! Of course there are uplifting aspects. At its core, it's offering a little slice of hope. The film follows 3 Acholi teenagers who live in an isolated refugee camp called Potango, in northern Uganda, as they prepare to compete with their classmates at the national music & dance competition in Kampala, the country's capital. It's wonderful to see children and teenagers who live in cramped conditions with traumatic pasts and uncertain futures hanging over their head enjoying music and dance.
Heaven forbid.
I'm not at all convinced that the fact that the film seems overproduced in some aspects takes away from those traumatic stories; it makes it just that much worse in many respects. I'd love to know what a non-'sugarcoated' documentary looks like in some of these reviewers eyes. And I say that as a confirmed cynic and pessimist.
Ce n'est pas parfait; but so few things are, documentaries especially. But I don't know - music got my grandmother out of the coal fields of West Virginia; I suppose I don't find it so ridiculous to think that teenagers in much worse positions might find it a powerful escape (certainly figuratively, and perhaps literally) as well.
(The soundtrack was fantastic; I really wished they hadn't mucked about with slow motion during the school's performance in parts, because it was pretty spectacular on its own)
A powerful documentary, even though it's too slick in many ways - too gorgeous, shots too slow - it's still powerful, and I'm not at all convinced that the goal is (as the Variety critic stated) to make the Western audience feel better about " genocide and global negligence." I mean, really? Even if things do seem too scripted at times, I find it hard to fathom that someone could feel that much better about the situation in Uganda after hearing a 14 year old boy say, regarding the time he and other children abducted by the Lord's Resistance Army were ordered to kill a field of farmers with the farmers' own hoes:
"Those farmers did nothing wrong. We killed them for no reason. They died a sad death it hurt me in so many ways. I've never even told my mother that I was forced to kill people."
Yes! I feel so much better about the upheaval and violence in Africa. After all, he enjoys playing the xylophone now, doesn't he? And he's even quite good at it! Of course there are uplifting aspects. At its core, it's offering a little slice of hope. The film follows 3 Acholi teenagers who live in an isolated refugee camp called Potango, in northern Uganda, as they prepare to compete with their classmates at the national music & dance competition in Kampala, the country's capital. It's wonderful to see children and teenagers who live in cramped conditions with traumatic pasts and uncertain futures hanging over their head enjoying music and dance.
Heaven forbid.
I'm not at all convinced that the fact that the film seems overproduced in some aspects takes away from those traumatic stories; it makes it just that much worse in many respects. I'd love to know what a non-'sugarcoated' documentary looks like in some of these reviewers eyes. And I say that as a confirmed cynic and pessimist.
Ce n'est pas parfait; but so few things are, documentaries especially. But I don't know - music got my grandmother out of the coal fields of West Virginia; I suppose I don't find it so ridiculous to think that teenagers in much worse positions might find it a powerful escape (certainly figuratively, and perhaps literally) as well.
(The soundtrack was fantastic; I really wished they hadn't mucked about with slow motion during the school's performance in parts, because it was pretty spectacular on its own)